Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The suit wasn’t uncomfortable. That was the first thing he learned: when a suit is expensive enough, you stop noticing it. Wool doesn’t itch, collars don’t strangle. But Jack Spicer still checked his cufflinks three times before breakfast, as if making sure the person in the mirror hadn't slipped away again during the night.

Two years had passed… two years since the last showdown.

.

.

.

For a while, Jack Spicer thought he might never open his bedroom door again.

It had been weeks since he last left it. The curtains were always drawn, and the air smelled faintly of metal and old plastics—the remains of half-built machines that would never wake up. His fingernails were bitten to the skin. His hair hung messily over his face. The mirror across the room hadn’t been glanced at in days.

He didn’t cry. That would’ve made things clearer, and clarity was not something he was offered. What he had was noise—too much of it. Inside his head, in the quiet hum of the house, in the echo of footsteps he couldn’t remember making. Thoughts looped until they blurred. Sleep was both too long and too shallow.

No one said anything, but Jack could tell they were waiting. His mother moved quietly in the hallway outside. Once, he heard her crying. He didn’t move.

He had considered many things. Most of them not worth naming.

Then one morning, without understanding why, he stood up.

He opened the wardrobe and, with no decision he could trace, reached past the dark jackets and red-trimmed coats to something buried near the back: a blue sweater-vest. It was soft, with a white collared shirt beneath it. A red tie. Khaki pants. He didn’t recognize the outfit—he wasn’t sure he’d ever worn it before.

He dressed without thinking. Slipped on brown loafers. Combed his hair back.

And then he opened the door.

Downstairs, the light was golden, too early for anyone to be pretending. His mother sat at the dining room table, motionless. Her eyes were swollen.

She looked up.

Jack stood at the foot of the stairs, clothes crisp, posture correct. Something between them froze.

He didn’t feel ready to speak. But he did.

“I’m sorry, Mother,” he said. “I’ll be better.”

She didn’t reply. Just reached for a handkerchief and nodded. He walked past her and made himself tea. The silence between them felt warmer than anything they’d said in months.

two years after Jack never wore the sweater-vest again. He didn’t throw it out, but he buried it back into the closet like an old photo you don’t want to remember loving. He returned to black—but not the theatrical black of capes and spikes. Now it was quiet: pullovers, tailored sweaters, soft jackets. Nothing flashy. Just neat. Sharp. Normal, if you didn’t look too close.

He wasn’t reformed. He was presentable.

At Saint Auguste’s Institute, Jack had become an enigma with a name too big to ignore. Other students treated him with respect because they had to. His family was powerful, old-money powerful. His intelligence was evident. His reputation, vague enough to be intriguing.

He smiled when needed, spoke only when it had purpose, and made everyone feel like they were speaking to someone just slightly above them.

But he didn’t have friends. Only… company.

People liked talking to Jack Spicer, but not one of them knew Jack.

He had come to terms with that.

He still talked to himself, though not aloud—unless he forgot. Most of it stayed inside. A voice, not hostile, not quite his. Sometimes, when the spirals began—overthinking, self-loathing, planning things he’d never do—that voice would step in with something disarmingly kind.

Not a counter-argument. Just a sentence.

“You’re not worthless.”

“Try again tomorrow.”

They didn’t feel real. Not like thoughts he chose. They just arrived. And they worked.

Jack hated that they worked.

Still, he moved forward—class by class, gesture by gesture. The evil boy genius faded into a myth. What was left was a controlled, quiet teenager with tired eyes and clean hands.

But every now and then, Jack did something unexpected: helped a younger student wire a circuit properly. Spoke gently to a professor after class. Held the door. And immediately after, he’d catch himself.

That wasn’t me, he’d think.
That was him.
That was the good one.

And for a brief moment, Jack would feel the burn of having accidentally been decent.

It made him uncomfortable. Not ashamed. Just… uncertain.

On the afternoon it started again, Jack was in the engineering lab alone.

The room smelled of solder and carpet glue. He had finished a group project early and was picking through a drawer of rejected materials. Wires, magnets, sensors with half-burnt cores.

He found a strip of copper—small, slightly curved. Ordinary. He turned it in his fingers.

Then—a pulse.

Not electric. Not static. Something else.

Something like recognition.

His fingers went cold. Breath tightened. That spinning feeling returned. Old fear. Old energy. He nearly dropped it.

But then a whisper, almost nothing:

“Don’t panic. It’s just beginning.”

He steadied.

Not calm. Just... less afraid.

He pocketed the copper.

Walked out slowly.

And as the campus bell rang behind him, Jack Spicer looked up toward the sky—just for a second—and felt something breathing beneath the world.

Not power. Not destiny.
Just a shift.

And he was listening.

Chapter Text

Jack Spicer did not leave his room for three hundred and sixteen days. Not truly. Sometimes his body shuffled beyond the door — to eat, to brush teeth in reluctant ritual, to respond with sharp, sarcastic barbs only when forced into social exchange — but that was not living outside the room. He inhabited the walls themselves, the crumpled blueprints with curling corners, the flickering lights of half-dismantled robots watching him with the cold accusation of silent jurors. His life compressed into the hollow spaces between thoughts, the dark void where neither past nor future offered refuge. Yet he was not alone in that silence. Not exactly. There was another voice. Always another voice. It was not a hallucination. He was not mad in the clinical sense. It was himself — a fractured self, a ghostly echo of the boy who had once donned the blue sweater-vest and smiled with brittle innocence, the “Good Jack” who had been spat back into the timeline like a bitter seed no soil could fully nurture.

When the timeline snapped back at the end, when the world rejected the fracture and stitched itself anew, Good Jack had not been erased. He was folded inside, a spectral twin pacing the same cracked skull. Jack did not remember how he got back home that night — one moment he was still screaming, soaked with tears and rage on the bloodied dirt of a broken timeline that had chewed him up and spat both versions of himself back out; the next he was in his bed, the real bed, beneath the peeling white ceiling, the blinking alarm clock like a pulse counting down indifferent time, the comforter stained with oil and a mattress spring poking out like a bare bone. How many days had passed? A week? More? Perhaps the world had broken again, and he was trapped in yet another fractured reality where no rules applied, where the monks no longer existed, where Jack Spicer had ceased to be. The only thing certain was that he did not want to rise, because to rise meant choosing a self, and he was loath to be either of the two versions that warred within.

He spent the first month lying beneath his desk — not in bed, not sprawled like a normal recluse, but wedged beneath a relic of his former mechanical obsessions, where wires hung like twisted vines and yellowed schematics were taped with desperate care. The dust settled thick on his throat, his eyes, his nails. Beneath that cramped sanctuary, the echo chamber of his mind dulled, shrank. He imagined Good Jack standing patiently outside the desk, smiling that glassy, polite smile and speaking in soft tones that grated like fingernails on a chalkboard. “We could do good things,” the voice murmured, “we could fix it.” But Jack only muttered in defeat, “There’s nothing to fix. Nothing left.” By the third month, his body had become a fragile shell. Ribs ached with every cough. Bruises bloomed like wet paper on pale skin. The refrigerator beeped insistently every five minutes, the door failing to seal, but he did not care to mend it. Once, with a flicker of desperation, he had tried to build — a simple mechanical limb extension, nothing grand — but the voice interrupted every line of code, every logical function: “That causes harm.” “You’re not the villain anymore.” “This isn’t who you are.” So he deleted the program, the backups, the folder, then kicked the monitor off the desk in one exhausted, quiet rage.

He thought of them sometimes. Of Raimundo, laughing with sunlit teeth, wielding wind like a second skin, bright and full of reckless energy. Kimiko, ever sharp and scolding, rolling her eyes with impatient affection, saying things like, “Of course he ran. Can’t even finish being evil properly.” Clay, slow and steady, voice soft and certain: “That boy was always gonna crack. Just a matter of time.” And Omi, sweet, loyal Omi, who was the only one Jack could imagine might have knocked on his door in the dark, leaving a bao bun wrapped carefully with a note: “You still exist.” But no one came. No calls. No messages. No signs of life from Dojo or even Wuya — who used to hiss his name like a curse — had not bothered to reach out. “Nobody wants a broken tool,” he whispered once to his reflection, and the mirror held its silence, offering no argument.

The cruelest days were those when he felt well. Those days were the real enemy. He would rise early, shower, eat three meals as if that restored him, sketch twenty brilliant ideas before noon — blueprints for city grids, armor, prosthetic limbs designed to heal rather than harm. He’d pace the room, muttering to himself, laughing without joy. But then the fall came. It never struck all at once, but like dusk, creeping slow and gold, draining light and warmth from the edges of his mind. The papers became childish scribbles. The ideas became nonsense. He read his own words and was overcome with nausea. “You’re nothing,” the voice said again. “And worse — you’re unfinished.” One night, unable to sleep, he lay on the cold bathroom floor, counting breath after breath until they blurred together. His gaze fixed on the faucet, wondering what might happen if he just turned the water on and let it fill the room. Not over his hands — just fill it. But he did not move. Not out of fear. Not out of resolve. But sheer exhaustion. He did not want to mop.

By the time his parents finally intervened — a full year had passed — the boy they once knew was gone. He was no villain, no genius, no ghostly “Good Jack.” He was a boy with trembling fingers, skin yellowed by neglect, a mouth full of words never finished. When the private therapists arrived in starched suits, clipboards in hand, Jack smiled like a corpse rehearsing the motions of life. When asked why he had not left his room, he answered simply, with the faintest sneer, “Why bother? I’m not home anyway.”

It was not a choice. That much he understood.

By the time they came to his room — his mother in a blouse too white, his father with a silence that reeked of boardrooms and settlements — he no longer had the strength to pretend. He sat on the corner of his bed with a pillow crushed against his ribs like armor, letting their words pour over him like sand, dry and endless and suffocating. They didn’t yell. No one ever yelled in that house. But the tone had shifted. It wasn’t disappointment anymore. It was logistics.

“Therapy will continue remotely.”

“The staff is discrete.”

“They’ll be used to your… sensitivities.”

There was a suitcase by the door before he even opened his mouth.

They didn't ask him to agree. They only told him which uniform size had been ordered.

And just like that, he was no longer Jack Spicer: Boy Genius, Evil Prodigy, or even the quiet ghost in the house.

He was just a student at École Internationale de Saint-Valéry , a school so exclusive it barely needed to exist. A place where lineage meant more than learning, where sons of diplomats and heirs of empires were told that the world was theirs — so long as they wore the correct shade of navy.

They cut his hair before the semester began. Not cruelly, just efficiently. The stylist’s hands were soft. The mirror was cleaner than he remembered. The red, once so sharp and defiant, had dulled. He hadn’t dyed it in months. Patches of white glared through like bone beneath a wound. The albino roots were claiming their territory again. He stared into the mirror and thought: Now I look exactly like someone who doesn’t know what he wants to be.

The uniform sweater-vest fit perfectly. Of course it did. Everything in that world fit perfectly — pressed collars, symmetrical syllabi, manicured dormitories, cafeteria meals so balanced they looked synthetic. Even the loneliness felt designed. Curated. Tasteful.

He was placed in the mathematics and applied engineering track, with personalized tutoring on Thursdays and peer advisement on Mondays. He said nothing for the first two weeks. Not out of rebellion — rebellion implied energy. No, Jack was simply... absent. He attended classes like a statue, responded with automatic sarcasm when provoked, and took notes with a kind of mechanical precision that left no room for the mess of actual curiosity. They called it progress. His therapist called it “functional compliance.” He called it a joke no one got.

The campus was beautiful in a way that made Jack suspicious. Ivy coiled along the brick walls like it was hired to do so. The trees bowed politely in the wind. Every student knew where to walk, when to smile, how to appear effortlessly important. Jack wandered the hallways like a glitch in the simulation. His shoes made too much noise on the polished floors. His nails had small black stains from oil that would never wash out completely. His eyes, pale and red-rimmed, drew glances. He heard them whisper. Who is he? What happened to him?

They didn’t know.

Of course they didn’t.

No one there had ever built a killer robot at twelve. No one there had ever nearly broken the world and then cried until their throat bled from screaming into a sky that rewrote itself.

No one there had a second voice in their head, quieter now, yes — but still present. Still waiting.

“Look at you,” the voice would whisper sometimes as Jack stared out a window that overlooked the north lawn, “you almost pass for normal.”

It was not a compliment.

The worst part was that no one knew he was faking. Not the teachers, not the students, not even the therapist he spoke to through a screen once a week. No one knew the jokes were just camouflage. No one knew the designs he handed in were things he’d already thought of three years ago and just polished to fit the rubric. No one knew that when he stared off during lectures, he wasn’t dreaming — he was calculating the tensile limits of the glass windows, wondering what noise it would make if it shattered.

Sometimes he imagined the monks passing him in the crowd. Raimundo in a scarf, looking distracted and unbothered; Kimiko glancing down at her phone; Clay scratching his head and asking if this was the right building. And Omi — stupid, bright-eyed Omi — pointing at the sky, marveling at a cloud like it was his first.

Of course they never came.

They had moved on.

Jack Spicer was a failed chapter in a story they had all outgrown.

Even Wuya had stopped appearing in his dreams. Chase’s voice, once sharp and omnipresent, had dissolved into static.

He wore the blue sweater-vest like penance. It itched at the collar. It hugged his shoulders in ways that made him feel childish. He imagined tearing it off in front of the whole student body, shouting something mad and brilliant — something that would make them see him, truly see — but he never did.

Instead, he went to class. Sat still. Smiled when necessary. Sharpened his pencils. Filed away the blueprints he sketched in the margins under fake names, tucked into folders marked "non-essential."

He was nobody.

And being nobody was safer than choosing the wrong somebody again.

Until one day, on his way back from a morning seminar, Jack cut through the courtyard to avoid the longer colonnade hall. The day was grey — not storming, not cold, just that heavy, metallic kind of grey that made everything look like it had already ended.

There was a small group of students gathered near the south steps. They were standing in a loose semicircle, not talking much, watching something. Maybe someone was playing music, or doing a street trick, Jack didn’t care to know. He was already pivoting to avoid them when something — a flicker — caught in the corner of his eye.

It wasn’t even a shape at first. Just… a stillness. A gesture. The way someone’s hand moved midair with too much precision for it to be casual. The tilt of a head that didn’t quite belong in the world of cell phones and leather satchels.

He didn’t look twice. Of course he didn’t.

He muttered something like “ugh, tourists,” under his breath and passed the crowd without pausing. He didn’t see who they were watching. He didn’t want to.

But five steps later, something pulled in his chest. A snag. Like tripping over a memory he hadn’t made yet.

The air behind him felt warped, like someone had drawn an invisible frame around the space and forgotten to erase it.

Jack didn't turn around.

He wouldn’t give it the satisfaction.

Still, that night — when he shut the dorm curtains and turned the lock on his bedroom door — he found himself sketching gloves. Not schematics. Not bots.

Just a pair of hands.

Gloved. Wordless. Mid-gesture.

And for the first time in a long time, the page didn’t disgust him.

He stared at it for a moment, thumb stained with graphite.

Then he closed the sketchbook, slid it under his mattress, and tried not to wonder what he was starting to remember.

Chapter Text

Raimundo pedaled up the winding trail overlooking Rio’s coastline, the salt in the air thick enough to taste, the trees swaying like quiet witnesses to a restless mind. This city was home, but it no longer felt like his. At nineteen, everything was both familiar and strangely out of reach — like a game he once knew how to play but forgot the rules.

He wasn’t the reckless kid anymore, crashing through life with wild grins and no plan. At that time, he carried the title of Dragon of Wind, the newly crowned Shoku Warrior, but it didn’t come with the confidence he expected. Leadership was heavier than the fiercest storm — not in muscle or skill, but in the gnawing weight that sat deep in his gut every morning. What if he made the wrong move? What if today was the day everything fell apart?

His rented beach house was quiet, almost too quiet. It was the perfect place to be alone with his thoughts and the endless rhythm of the waves. Every dawn, he trained — pushing his limits, bending the wind, trying to master not just the elements but himself. The ocean became his sparring partner, and sometimes, when the breeze carried just right, it almost felt like it was listening.

Still, there was a hollow where the others used to be. Omi’s fierce drive, Kimiko’s sharp mind, Clay’s steady strength — they all drifted like distant stars, each shining in their own place. The threads that once tied them together frayed with time, and Raimundo felt the weight of that loss more than anything.

He was spinning in circles sometimes, wondering if he was enough — if being the Dragon meant carrying more than just power. Maybe it meant carrying loneliness too.

That morning, a knock at the door broke the routine. A courier handed him a small, cream-colored envelope, sealed with a wax stamp he recognized without needing to open it.

Master Fung’s handwriting inside was as precise and calm as ever:

Something big is happening

Raimundo stared at the words, the paper crinkling softly between his fingers. It wasn’t just a command — it was a reminder, a call to step back into a role he wasn’t sure he wanted or deserved. He folded the letter again, feeling its edges crease beneath his skin, like a weight pressing him to choose.

Could he still lead? Could he still be the one they needed?

Outside, the wind rattled the windowpane, the sky darkening with clouds that hadn’t yet broken. Raimundo rose, shoulders squared, swallowing the knot of doubt.

He breathed in deep, the ocean air filling his lungs, steadying the storm inside.

The time to act had come…

In another place Kimiko sat on the edge of her futon, the thin mattress barely cushioning the ache in her knees. The small room smelled faintly of cold rice and stale air, the kind of smell that pressed down on you after a day spent in silence. The city outside pulsed with its usual noise, but she heard none of it.

She thought of the days when the world was simpler, when they were all together, and even then, she had felt a strange distance—like she was watching a play unfold from backstage, never quite part of the crowd.

Now, the years had stretched that distance into a canyon. Omi had his meditations and certainties; Clay had his quiet stubbornness; Raimundo carried the weight of leadership like a shadow that sometimes swallowed him whole. And she—she carried a cold certainty that things were breaking apart, that the pieces wouldn’t fit back together the same way.

A message buzzed from her phone. She didn’t rush to check it. It was Clay—short, to the point. Something about the Temple, about a failing balance.

She wondered if anyone else felt it, the uneasy tightening beneath the surface of their lives.

She didn’t want to hope. Hope was a dangerous thing—too easy to break, too hard to hold onto when everything you believed in was slipping through your fingers.

But there was no choice now. The letter from Master Fung—its words had a cold finality. Return. The balance fails.

Kimiko folded her hands tightly in her lap, feeling the strain in her fingers. Would they answer? Could they?

She stared out at the city’s gray horizon and felt the weight of all the things left unsaid, the old wounds still raw beneath the calm.

And in the silence of the room, the question lingered like a shadow—was this the beginning of something new, or just the unraveling of what little they had left?

The night pressed in around her, thin curtains doing little to keep out the city’s restless glow. Kimiko’s thoughts tangled with the weight of her name—a name that carried expectations like chains wrapped tight around her wrists.

Her family was gentle about what was expected of her: honor, perfection, discipline. Always discipline. To be the smart one, the responsible one, the quiet pillar holding everything up. But in the moments when no one was watching, the weight of those expectations felt like a slow suffocation.

She had studied, trained, sharpened herself against the edges of their traditions, but the harder she tried, the more the question gnawed at her: What if I’m not enough? Not smart enough, not strong enough, not worthy of the legacy she was supposed to uphold.

The letter from Master Fung was a summons not just to duty, but to a reckoning she didn’t want.

Balance fails.

The phrase echoed in her mind like a verdict, not just for the world, but for her own fractured certainty.

She feared that answering the call would unravel more than just old battles—it might pull apart the fragile threads she’d spent years weaving around her heart.

Yet, to ignore it felt like turning her back on everything she’d been taught to protect. And so the silence pressed heavier, filled with doubts that no amount of logic could dispel.

Am I ready? The question stayed unanswered, lingering like smoke in a room too small to breathe.

Her fingers tightened once more, knuckles whitening.

Somewhere deep inside, beneath the stoic mask, Kimiko knew that this—this moment—was the edge of everything she’d been running toward.

A slow hush descended upon the courtyard of Xiaolin Temple, as though the ancient walls themselves held their breath. Clouds gathered in muted patterns overhead, heavy with distant promise and uncertain rain. Beneath the wide veranda, a solitary form brushed barefoot along the polished stone floor—Omi, seated in quiet meditation. His early breaths came with the precision he had learned through a lifetime of rituals; yet now they trembled, as if he felt some disturbance rather than dispelling it.

Across from him, just beyond the painted lotus blossoms of the courtyard gate, stood Master Fung. His face, carved with years of patient discipline, seemed almost unreadable. But his eyes—bright and deliberate—were windows of quiet authority. He watched Omi’s breaths settle, then waited, the silence stretching between them like a drawn bow.

A door clicked softly in the distance. Dojo emerged, his posture subdued, his expression tinted with concern. He glanced once toward the Temple’s inner rooms—where each monk’s journey and spirit called him back to unity—but returned his gaze to Master Fung. It was as if he himself carried some small tremor of doubt.

“Master,” Dojo said, voice clear but hushed. “The others will arrive shortly. Omi… are you ready?”

Omi opened his eyes, his gaze distant for a moment, weighing the weather, the fragrant breeze drifting through the open courtyard. “I am always ready,” he replied, but the words suggested uncertainty, a man recalling what had once come so naturally. He rose slowly, smoothing the creases of his ceremonial robe, the movement deliberate, unhurried. There was no flourish—only the gravity of purpose.

Master Fung inclined his head. “Leave us, Dojo.”

Dojo hesitated but did not object. He stepped back into the shade, offering a single nod before crossing beneath the veranda’s shadow into the inner hall.

Only Omi and Master Fung remained, and the temple’s silence enfolded them again.

“Your focus has shifted,” Master Fung observed, his tone calm but not idle.

Omi swallowed. “The imbalance—I feel it in the river winds where I meditate. The current changed. It is… stagnant. Even my element resists me.”

“That is no small thing,” Master Fung said. He paused, as though considering every syllable. “We have come through numerous trials—Wuya’s manipulations, Chase young, the Great Road, the fracturing of time. But this… this is different. It feels like a drumbeat from something beyond our art.”

Omi let the words settle. He used the traditional breath to steady himself, inhaling deeply, then releasing.

“And the others?” Omi asked quietly. “Are they prepared?”

Master Fung’s gaze moved toward the entrance. “Each will come. They will feel, each in their way. We all have our roles.”

They caught the soft creak of a gate. Clay entered. His boots clicked steadily on the stones. Dust clung to his pant legs; his posture was as solid as an oak. He had just ridden across fields that quaked, and he carried the faint scent of sun-dry sweat and grass—earth still clinging to his skin.

Master Fung bowed slightly. “Clay.”

Clay inclined his head in return. No smile, but no harshness either—just the simplicity of respect between old allies. Omi followed suit. The three stood in a quiet tableau: the master, the one whose mastery was water and, and the cowboy-hero anchored by earth.

Clay said nothing for a moment. Then, softer, he spoke:

“The land shook under me at first light,” he said. “The cattle—they scattered. The horses, too. I thought maybe it was just a quake, but the ground hummed with tension. So I came.”

Master Fung folded his hands. “Thank you, Clay. It is no small concern when the earth trembles without storms.”

Clay shifted his weight. “And where's Raimundo?”

Master Fung pursed his lips. “He too is summoned—his element is unsettled. In due time, all shall gather.”

Clay nodded. “Of course.”

They lapsed into quiet again, each listening to the temple’s echo—sting of wind, hush of leaves, silent knowledge settling around them. A few distant birds called, then fell silent.

An eternity passed.

“Master,” Omi finally said, voice thinner, less certain, “what if I’m… not strong enough today?”

Master Fung’s eyes softened. “Strength is not only in power, Omi—it lies in knowing one’s limitations, and then surpassing them. Do not doubt yourself. Doubt the imbalance.”

Omi bowed his head. Clay stood still. Not a sound, save for the breeze through bamboo. Then two distant footsteps.

The shuffle of a door.

Master Fung looked toward the entrance again.

Omi’s eyes followed.

Clay’s jaw set.

They waited, anchored in anticipation, as the Temple’s rooms seemed to exhale.

Dojo appeared again, this time guiding Raimundo around the corner, the monastic robe clean but dust-swept. He paused, and the three figures before him—cloaked in purpose and stone-calm—stood ready.

Raimundo’s gaze did not flicker to any of them. Not yet. Instead, he stared at the courtyard’s center, where the elements converged in wind-rippled pool, polished stone, and soaring pillars. The chapel’s bell chimed—deep, mournful, resonant.

Dojo spoke softly, but the silence had grown so taut that the message crackled like lightning: “We are in so much trouble…”

Slowly, Raimundo released a breath he’d held since departure, folds of tension smoothing from his shoulders.

Master Fung inclined his head. The three of them—Wind, Water, Earth—stood as guardians once more, their shared past a bond that refused to fracture even when they had. The Temple’s walls waited. The world asked again.

A hush descended. The four stood in a nearly perfect semicircle beneath the open courtyard, each element represented: wind, earth, water, fire. All that remained was the spark—and with quiet footing, Kimiko stepped from the Temple’s shadows.

She moved without flourish, yet every step spoke of determination. Taller now, still lean and precise, she carried herself with a kind of coiled energy—someone used to bursting forward but learning restraint. Her black hair fell in a single ponytail, no longer playful pigtails but something simpler and stronger. The edges of her robe were dust-kissed, as if she left behind traces of another life to return.

She paused at the threshold, watching Raimundo , Clay , and Omi standing with their Master at the heart of the courtyard, the Temple’s stone and bamboo whispering age-old calm. 

At first glance, she saw Raimundo’s shoulders stiffen, Clay’s jaw settle into ready strength, Omi’s breath steady in silent focus. Each carried a burden—age and training pressed into their bearing. She felt it echo in her own bones: eighteen years of code-breaking, attempts to prove herself, battles fought in boardrooms and deserts, triumphs flickering between power and frustration.

Master Fung spoke in his deep, measured tone: “Wind restless, earth unsettled, waters silent, fire… harbored for too long. Imbalance grows.”

Kimiko felt a small dart of guilt. Fire had felt distant these days, a dormant ember she buried beneath schedules and algorithms. She stepped forward, voice crisp though her stomach Windsor-knotted.

“I felt something,” she said. Not too loud. Not too soft. Enough. “My tools—they reacted on their own. A gadget in the Tokyo lab began sparking… then nothing. Like it was overloaded by… something.”

Master Fung inclined his head slightly. “Your fire remained quiet. We will awaken it.” He allowed space for her to meet his gaze.

Clay shuffled his boots, nodding. “I felt the ground shift. Even before I came.”
Omi added simply, “Water quieted.”

They looked at Raimundo. He drew in a deep breath, wind lifting the ends of his robe. “I sensed… restlessness. Air trembled against me like an alarm.” His voice was low, but carried weight.

Master Fung turned toward Kimiko. “And you, Dragon of Fire—what do you bring?”

Kimiko swallowed past the tightness in her throat. Keep it essential , she reminded herself—no bravado. “A spark. But not… aggressive. A warning.” She met Master Fung’s eyes. “I’m ready.”

He nodded once. Dojo landed beside her, brushing a wing against her ankle—solid comfort.

For a moment, they stood as one team again: four monks and their Master, bound by more than nostalgia. By necessity.

Master Fung’s expression shifted, a quiet steel entering his voice. “The world is at risk. Not just through what is found—but through what is fought and neglected. We begin here, at home, with our senses, our training, and our unity.” He paused as a distant chime rang across the courtyard—an hour passed, a summons to rise.

The four shared a glance. Uncertainty clung to them—the weight of training forgotten, of disuse, of bonds thinned. But beneath it lay an unspoken promise: they would stand.

In that silence, the imbalance presented itself: not with light or thunder, but in stillness. It needed response. They would answer.

Dojo cooed. The monks moved, one breath, one step, toward the gate—Kimiko alongside Omi, Clay, Raimundo. Together.

It was the first time in a long time they walked in step

The four dragons stood in a hush beneath the wide eaves of the temple courtyard—Omi with rigid composure, Clay still bearing the scent of ranch dust and morning, Raimundo’s stance firm but thoughtful, Kimiko’s eyes scanning every shadow. Master Fung presided with gentle gravity, Dojo perched nearby, limbs tucked under in a rare stillness.

Master Fung’s eyes traveled across each of them. “You’ve all sensed it—something stirring in fields, skies, machines, and water. You’re not mistaken. We must act.”

Silence answered.

Omi exhaled softly. “When I meditated this morning, the streams bowed away. They didn’t guide me.”

Master Fung nodded. “Any disturbance. Clay?”

Clay shifted his weight. “Horses stamped as if the ground changed beneath them.” His voice was steady, though he avoided eye contact. “It wasn’t normal.”

Kimiko unfolded her arms. “My lab computers… they started running diagnostics without command. Then they shut themselves down.” Her gaze flickered with frustration. “Like they sensed something was wrong and couldn’t figure it out.”

Raimundo closed his eyes. “The wind stuttered—like someone punched a hole through its current.”

Master Fung inclined his head. “Each of you… This isn’t coincidence.”

From beneath the dais, Master Fung retrieved a cylindrical case: the Scroll of Prophetic Truth . He placed it gently before them, mindfully. Its seal shimmered faintly, as if alive. “Whenever hidden fault lines appear—whether in nature or spirit—the Scroll is drawn.”

He looked to each Dragon as he uncurled the parchment. Subtle gold script danced across the surface. Dojo flexed as he stepped closer. Shadows bent toward the artifact.

Kimiko leaned in first. “What will it show us?”

The ground trembled—barely. The Scroll quivered. Ink rippled, then stilled, drawing a new symbol where none had been: a fractured line zigzagging through a circle.

Master Fung cleared his throat softly. “This symbol appears when multiple forces are pulling at the world—without harmony. Elements out of sync, voices becoming scattered.”

Raimundo frowned. He folded his arms. “So it shows the problem. What about solution?”

Master Fung’s gaze softened. “We must read deeper.” His fingers traced delicate lines beneath the symbol, seeking hidden layers. “This scroll… It not only reveals fragmentation but can guide us toward the fault’s origin. We must act together.”

Clay shifted. “Together how? I mean, are we hunting a place or a person?”

Master Fung sighed. “We do not yet know. But the Scroll responds when we move in resonance. Touch each phase with your element. The Scroll itself will guide us.”

Omi nodded deliberately. “Then we begin here.” He laid a palm on the scroll; the parchment glowed with crystalline energy at his touch.

One by one, each monk laid a hand on the scroll: Clay’s earth, Raimundo’s wind, Kimiko’s fire, Omi’s water. The glow intensified, layering colors across the courtyard stones. The Scroll whispered in subtle waves—a sound only they sensed.

“Dojo,” Master Fung said, voice gentle, “fetch the mission supplies. We leave at dawn.”

Dojo nodded, eyes bright with purpose.

Silence followed them as tension shifted. Their robes may have dust on them, but they stood clearer now—less hesitant, less scattered.

The Scroll’s glow faded. Kimiko whispered around her teeth, “Let’s see what it shows us.”

Master Fung closed his eyes and nodded. “Where together we falter, together we mend.”

Chapter Text

Jack Spicer was not speaking.

Not in any meaningful way, at least.

He was seated across from the psychiatrist legs crossed in a spindly angle, sweater vest clinging to a body that looked too long for itself, as if stretched by anxiety. His stare had flattened into something that was not quite bored, not quite vacant, but certainly not interested in participating in what his mother had tearfully described as "a crucial part of his recovery process."

The psychiatrist a man named Dr. Calder who wore beige cardigans and always smiled like he was partway through a joke about his own mortalitylet the silence bloom. It was the kind of silence that therapists were trained to enjoy. Fertile. Non-invasive. Full of possibility.

Jack seemed entirely unbothered. He blinked slowly, deliberately, like a reptile measuring sunlight. If there was a thought in his head, it had decided to keep its coat on and remain standing by the exit.

Dr. Calder finally cleared his throat. “Would you like to start?”

Jack blinked again. His lips parted slightly, then closed. That was all.

It wasn’t defiance. It was inertia.

Jack had spoken, earlier that week, to a traffic light. He had mumbled three words to a pigeon. He had cursed under his breath at his locker combination. But now, with a licensed adult whose only crime was a PhD in empathy, he was as expressive as a tree in winter.

Dr. Calder, undeterred, picked up the notebook.

“You left this behind last week.”

He said it softly, as if presenting a wounded animal. Jack did not react.

Calder flipped through the pages. Schematics. Doodles. Blankness. Mess. Then—

“Well,” Calder said, tilting the page so the sun caught it. “That’s… interesting.”

The drawing was done in pencil, sharp and pressurized, lines so aggressive they had ripped the paper in places. A sphere, like a globe. And inside, something that might have been a face, or the memory of one, but lacked features. Just a suggestion—no eyes, no mouth. Gloves, though. Black, delicate gloves. Several sketches of them, repeated like a stutter. And behind them… a boy?

Jack still didn’t look up. His fingers twitched once on his knee.

Calder flipped again. Another page. Another globe. Then a sloppily drawn lizard with cross eyes and the words “STUPID LIZARD” scrawled beside it in uppercase.

“Well,” Calder said again, brighter this time, “that’s a tone shift.”

Jack rolled his eyes. A micro-expression. Progress.

“You’re quite the artist,” Calder continued, careful not to press. “And quite the mecha designer too. These bots do they have names?”

Jack’s voice emerged like an old machine turning over in the cold: “No.”

“No?” Calder raised his eyebrows. “Not even that one?” He tapped a diagram that was half-robot, half-insect, and absurdly armed. “Looks like it could kill me and also take over the vending machine industry.”

Jack tilted his head. “That one was just… something. I don’t name things anymore.”

“Why not?”

“Because they don’t stay.”

The air changed. Calder sat back. Jack looked away.

There were more drawings: a lizard (again), this time wearing what looked like a monocle; the same gloved hands reaching out of a void; another face, unfinished, its smile smeared by erasure.

“So,” Calder said carefully, “what about this one? The gloves… the smile. A boy?”

Jack flinched.

It was minor. A muscle, twitching in the neck. But enough.

“I didn’t say it was a boy,” Jack said, too fast.

“No, you didn’t,” Calder agreed. “But it seems… affectionate. Repetitive. You’ve drawn him—this—more than anything else.”

Jack’s hands were now clasped tightly together.

“It’s not anyone. It’s just something I saw once. Maybe.”

“That sounds like someone,” Calder said gently.

Jack shifted in his chair, finally looking up. His eyes were pale, rimmed in red, like he'd been running on sleep that wouldn’t land. The words came out in a rush:

“I didn’t draw it because of that. I don’t even remember. I just… it’s a shape. A thing. I don’t—this isn’t therapy, this is just… trying to interpret broken geniuses.”

“Mm,” Calder nodded, smiling faintly. “I wouldn’t say broken.”

Jack scoffed.

“I’m not having a breakdown. I’m just a little—” he waved a hand in a vague circle, “—chronically unbothered.”

There was a pause.

Then Calder leaned forward, tapping the gloves gently. “I think you’re lonely.”

Jack laughed. Not a real laugh something brittle and too loud. “What gave it away? My notebook of stupid lizards or my refusal to make eye contact?”

“I think,” Calder said, still looking at the drawing, “that maybe someone left. And maybe they were a boy. And maybe you miss them. Just a little.”

Jack turned scarlet.

“I don’t—why do you keep saying ‘boy’? It could be anyone. A girl. A friend. A ghost.”

“A ghost in gloves?”

“Why are you like this?!”

“You tell me.”

The silence that followed was different. Not stagnant, but fragile. Alive.

Jack leaned back in the chair. His jaw was clenched, but he wasn’t scowling anymore. More… tired. Like something in him had just dropped its sword.

“I didn’t mean to draw him. I don’t even know who it is,” he said finally, voice softer than before. “But… it feels like I forgot something. Someone. Or maybe I just made him up to feel less… empty.”

Calder nodded, gentle now. “And the lizard?”

“Definitely real,” Jack said. “And definitely stupid.”

Calder smiled.

Jack didn’t smile back, but his fingers stopped gripping each other. A long pause fell between them again, but it no longer felt blank. Something had filled the air memory, ache, perhaps something unnamed.

Outside, the city breathed.

Inside, Jack Spicer sat with his past, unknowable and oddly present, wearing gloves he couldn’t explain and a face he’d drawn in a hundred different fragments, still searching for the right one.

Jack, still flushed from the gloves incident, crossed his arms and tried to radiate hostility. He looked like someone trying to weld steel beams using only sarcasm and self-loathing. It wasn’t working on Calder, who remained seated with the patience of a monk and the hopeful energy of a father goose.

The psychiatrist gently turned another page of the notebook.

“So…” he said, like he was offering Jack a particularly polite way to defuse a bomb, “...the lizard.”

Jack sighed so hard his entire soul deflated into the chair.

“Must we?”

“Well,” Calder said, ever smiling, “he appears twelve times. Angry. Cross-eyed. Sometimes with the word ‘Stupid’ underlined three times. Once, he’s wearing a crown and it just says: ‘NO THANK YOU.’ That suggests… feelings.”

“It’s not that deep,” Jack muttered.

Calder nodded thoughtfully. “All right. But if it were that deep…”

Jack groaned. Loudly. Like a kid being forced to hand over the TV remote. “Fine. It’s… it’s about a person. Or—whatever. A force of smug nature.”

“A person you didn’t like?”

“I loathed him.”

“Mmm.”

“Like, really. Properly. Like, the way you hate someone whose very face feels like a test you’re failing just by existing.”

Calder looked genuinely sympathetic. “Tell me more about that.”

Jack flailed a hand dramatically. “I don’t know . He was—he is —everything wrong with the universe wrapped in an eight-pack and sanctimony. Arrogant. Old. Creepy. Probably wore moisturizer made of the dreams of dead orphans.”

“And did he… hurt you?” Calder’s voice was gentle now. The kind that you could fall into like a warm bath, or a very slow avalanche.

Jack blinked. He looked down.

“No,” he said, after a pause. “Not—not like that. Just… he made me feel small. Like… he didn’t even have to try. Just walked into the room and all the air belonged to him.”

Calder waited.

“I tried to be powerful once,” Jack said suddenly, his voice dropping. “And he laughed. Like I was…”

He shook his head.

“I drew the lizard because I didn’t want to draw him. The real him. That felt—like letting him live in my head. So I made him ugly. It helped.”

“Ah,” Calder said, with a kind of soft wonder. “That’s very human.”

Jack rubbed his temples. “It’s very pathetic.”

“I think it’s brave.”

Jack snorted. “You would. You’re emotionally adjusted. Probably eats celery and wakes up without existential dread.”

Calder smiled again endlessly patiently, like kindness was something he could pour into tea.

“You said he made you feel small,” he said. “But what did you want from him?”

Jack froze.

The question dropped into the room like an elevator shaft. It was too simple. Too honest.

Calder wasn’t looking at the drawings anymore. He was looking at Jack. And not with pity. Not even with curiosity. Just presence. Warm, clear-eyed presence, the kind of thing Jack hadn’t felt in years, maybe ever.

Jack sat back in his chair. His legs bounced.

“I don’t know,” he said. And it was the truth he knew he wouldn’t get any love from him. “Validation? Respect? I thought maybe if I was strong enough if I built something big enough he’d stop laughing. He’d look. Just once. And not like I was a joke.”

“Did he ever?”

Jack hesitated.

“I think… once, he almost did.”

“That must’ve mattered.”

“Yeah,” Jack said softly. “That’s probably why I hate him so much.”

Calder said nothing for a while. He let Jack sit with it.

Then, with an extraordinary lightness, he said, “Well. For what it’s worth, I think your lizard drawings are very emotionally articulate.”

Jack let out a laugh. An actual, short, startled laugh.

Calder turned the page again.

“Back to the gloves,” he said brightly. “They’re quite beautiful. Who do you think he is?”

Jack stared at the page.

The drawings were more delicate than he remembered. Faint. Pale lines. Careful hands. The ghost of a smile. Something about the posture was… patient.

“I don’t know,” he said.

Calder raised an eyebrow. “You’re sure it wasn’t a boyfriend?”

Jack practically exploded. “WHAT?!”

“Well, you did draw him a lot. With tenderness. There’s motion in the lines. A kind of… search. Sometimes we draw the people we miss most when we don’t even realize we’re missing them.”

Jack was now pink. Actually pink.

“It wasn’t—it’s not—I don’t even remember him! I just—I doodled it. Out of boredom. I don’t have boyfriends. I barely have food .”

“Mm,” Calder said, smiling like he’d just found a favorite book left under his chair. “I’m just saying, statistically speaking, you strike me as someone very comfortable with male company.”

“I—! That’s—!” Jack stammered, now pulling his sweater vest like it might shield him from the psychic embarrassment radiating out of his pores.

Calder, bless his cardigan-wrapped soul, just nodded. “Nothing wrong with that. I was just curious.”

“I hate this session.”

“You’ve said that three times. That’s usually when we start making progress.”

Jack folded his arms tightly.

Calder gently closed the notebook. His voice turned low again. Kind, but rooted. “Jack… people who feel small often grow the most. But only if they stop pretending they’re invisible.”

Jack didn’t reply.

But his fingers twitched again. Not clenching. Not resisting.

Just moving. Like something inside had started to stir.

Calder didn’t press further.

He simply smiled—less like a therapist now, more like a very old friend seeing someone again after a long, confusing winter.

“You know,” he said, softly folding the notebook and sliding it aside, “it’s nice to see you again.”

Jack blinked.

Calder tapped a knuckle gently on the edge of the desk, like he was coaxing a thought forward instead of saying it outright. “You. Not the tightly-wrapped, monosyllabic version who comes in here trying to pass as a brick wall. But this Jack. The one who rolls his eyes like punctuation, who talks with his hands, who—grudgingly—still gives a damn about things.”

Jack looked at him, half-offended, half-unsure.

“I’m not a Rubik’s Cube you can resolve for your self-help podcast,” he mumbled.

“No,” Calder said, with a grin that made Jack want to throw something and laugh at the same time. “You’re just Jack. And I like that guy. He's the only one who's ever insulted my tie and cried over a physics documentary in the same hour.”

“That documentary was deeply misleading,” Jack muttered.

“I know.”

Silence fell for a moment, not awkward, not heavy. Just space. Like a room letting itself breathe.

Outside, the sun filtered through the blinds like diluted honey. The air conditioner rattled. Jack didn’t know what to do with his hands, so he sat on them.

He didn’t feel fixed.

He didn’t feel better.

But he didn’t feel quite as… tight.

It was like Calder had said something true without using any sharp edges. Not truth like a needle, but like a soft press to the chest. Something that made Jack realize he’d spent so long armoring himself, he’d forgotten what it felt like to be seen and not immediately dissected.

“I don’t like the real Jack,” he said quietly.

Calder tilted his head. “That’s okay. You’re still learning who he is.”

Jack shrugged.

“I liked the villain one. He had focus. Drama. A cape.”

Calder chuckled. “And back pain, probably.”

“Fair.”

“You don’t have to pick a final version right now,” Calder said. “You’re nineteen. You’re allowed to redraw yourself a hundred times. The only thing I’d suggest…”

Jack raised an eyebrow.

“Don’t erase him completely,” Calder said gently, tapping the closed notebook. “The one who made the gloves. Or even the one who drew the angry lizard.”

Jack looked down, then out the window.

The city looked less like a trap today. Less like a distant, mocking billboard for someone else’s better life. It still felt wrong, a little too loud, a little too clean—but not so much that he couldn’t breathe in it.

“I hate how you do that,” he grumbled. “End the session with a therapy fortune cookie.”

“Your hate fuels me,” Calder said.

Jack snorted.

The clock beeped. Calder stood, smoothing his cardigan like a curtain call.

“Same time next week?”

Jack hesitated. But only a second.

“Yeah,” he said. “Sure.”

He didn’t rush out of the office this time. He just grabbed his bag, tucked the notebook inside, and let the door close quietly behind him.

In the hallway, the air smelled like coffee and floor polish. For a moment, Jack stood still, blinking.

He didn’t know why but something felt a little lighter. As if a very old gear had clicked once to the right. Nothing earth-shattering. Just a nudge.

A breath.

Maybe that was enough for now.

Chapter Text

Even after Calder, even after the silence and the space and the gentle, awful kindness, Jack didn’t feel right.

He sat in his classroom—third desk from the back, next to the window—and it was as if he were a poorly assembled puppet with a too-tight string around the throat. His body was present. He blinked. He copied down notes. He tapped his pen on the desk in intervals of five. But none of it felt like him.

His thoughts had started to split again. He hadn’t told Calder—not yet. He was supposed to tell Calder these things, but how could he, when even naming it felt like treason?

He wasn’t hearing voices. Not really. He was hearing himself .

But… doubled. Echoed. Crooked in the mirror.

One voice was the Jack he showed: thin-lipped, sarcastic, appropriately disaffected.

The other was that thing he only half-recognized: Good Jack.
The one who smiled at teachers and apologized when he didn’t mean it.
The one who did laundry on Sundays and called Calder “Doctor.”
The one who swallowed his words like pills and wanted to be a person .
A good, normal , socially pleasant person with stable neurotransmitters and a working phone calendar.

Jack hated him with the kind of cold fury usually reserved for fictional betrayals.
He hated how Good Jack whispered things like:
“Maybe we should go to that study group.”
“Maybe people don’t hate you, maybe you’re just difficult.”
“Maybe if you smiled more—”

Jack clenched his jaw so hard his molars ached.

The air outside the classroom window looked thick. Not polluted—just dense.
A kind of density that settled in the bones. Like the city was carrying too much of something: tension, noise, memory.
Something was off.

People had been disappearing.

At first it was just Jessica Ortega , who was annoying and always late, so nobody really noticed.
Then a sophomore.
Then a teacher didn’t show up.
Then Calder’s parking spot was empty for two days, and Jack had almost thrown up thinking the worst until he saw him in the hallway.

Other schools too. Other people.
Gone.

No warning. No news. No explanation.
No noise .
That was the worst part.

The school should have been panicking. But instead… everyone acted like static. Like nothing happened, or they couldn’t quite focus on it. Students mentioned someone was “sick” or “maybe transferred.” No flyers. No vigils.

The air was dense.

And Jack—Jack was expected to function. To fake his laugh. To turn in his essays.
To be Good Jack.

He wanted to slam his head into the nearest wall. Not to die. Not to pass out.
Just to reset something.
The thought came and went like a reflex.

No one noticed.

No one noticed that his pupils were uneven sometimes. That his handwriting trembled. That he forgot names he’d known since childhood.
No one noticed that Jack Spicer was coming undone by degrees.

Or maybe they did.
And no one cared.

The halls were empty now.

It was that strange, hollow hour after the last bell, when even the janitor had gone quiet and the shadows grew longer in their corners. Jack walked with his head low, hands in the pockets of a coat he didn’t remember putting on, steps echoing too loudly for a boy who so desperately wished to disappear.

He was dizzy.
And it wasn’t physical. Not entirely.

It was like his body had become an overexposed photograph — white at the edges, too bright in the middle , his sense of direction warped by some sickening internal lurch. His brain had turned to wet paper. Thoughts slid off the surface before he could hold them.

Still, he performed.

He laughed when others laughed. He nodded on cue. He scribbled assignments he would later forget to turn in.
Every movement now felt like acting inside a collapsing set, a theatre where the lights sparked and the floorboards creaked with the weight of things unsaid.

“Get better,” they said.

He tried.
God—he tried .

But the medications had stopped working. Or maybe he had. It was hard to say what was breaking and what had simply revealed itself. A trick of the mind, like dust catching light and appearing beautiful — until it chokes you.

At home, he had seen it.

The pamphlet left open on the kitchen table. The phone number underlined. “Private Residential Recovery Facility,” it read. But he knew better. He knew the words they had used, words with more breath and less meaning: sanitarium , reform retreat , away . The old good ways , as his grandmother once said. “Nothing a little quiet and regimen can’t fix, like in the old days. Back when people didn’t wallow.”

Wallow. As if this thing growing inside him, this sickness that sounded like himself but worse, was indulgence.

Jack hated them for it.
His parents. Wuya.
The monks, with their eternal, infuriating balance.
Chase, that unbearable bean-paste-eyed fraud.
And — and —

He pressed the heel of his palm against his temple.

There was someone else.
A boy. A face just behind the veil of memory, the kind that makes your stomach turn because it should be so clear —
But he couldn’t remember.
He couldn’t remember!
And the not-remembering was a wound.

“I’m not sick,” he muttered, to no one. “I’m not —”
But the sound of his own voice felt like lying under a cold blanket.
It clung. It pricked.

The classroom door opened under his hand and he flinched. Had he walked here on purpose?
Was it even his classroom?
The desks looked the same, all bolted down like a cage of quiet minds.
His desk had crumpled papers in it — no, drawings — technical renderings, half-finished bots with limbs that seemed to reach out of the page like something trying to live.

Even his work was beginning to splinter.

One page was simply black ink, frantic strokes layered so thick the paper had torn.
Another was just a name scratched out until the page bled.
He didn’t remember writing it. He didn’t remember anything.

He sat.
The room moaned slightly under the wind.
And there — on the teacher’s desk — sat a small, tightly wound scroll.

Not paper. Not notebook. A scroll. Tied with red thread. No name. No symbol. Just sitting, patiently.

Jack’s stomach dropped.

He didn’t reach for it, not yet. Just stared.

The silence shifted. His ears rang.

“I’m not going back,” he whispered.

And somehow, he knew: this wasn’t a message for Good Jack.

This was for him.

The part of him he had buried.
The part of him that hated everything.
The part of him that still remembered the truth, even if it hid behind fog.

He reached out with trembling fingers.

Outside, a crow shrieked — a brief, violent punctuation in the still air.

And Jack Spicer — fractured, resentful, and not quite real — picked up the scroll and untied the thread.

And Jack Spicer — fractured, resentful, and not quite real — picked up the scroll and untied the thread.

It was late. The kind of late that doesn't howl but whispers, the sort of lateness that drips slowly from the ceiling tiles of the empty classroom and coils like mist around the ankles. The desk beneath his elbows was sticky from someone else's discarded lunch, but he hadn’t moved in over an hour. His fingers twitched as the seal of the scroll came loose, unfurling paper that had the texture of memory, old breath, and candle smoke.

Inside, no long declarations. No smug lectures. Just words, written in Kimiko’s sharp, hurried strokes.

“We need help.”

That was it. Just that. Jack felt his face scrunch up — not in confusion, not entirely in pain either, but in that sour, ambiguous middle ground where disbelief boils too long and becomes anger.

Help?

What kind of trap was that?

Help?

He had spent years being the ridicule of their order, the red-haired boy-genius who built doomsday machines only to trip on their wires. And now— now —they asked him for help?

He wanted to crumple the scroll. Wanted to chew it up, swallow it, spit it at the universe. Instead, his arms moved like machinery — cold, stiff — packing the scroll into his bag, along with the sketches, broken pencils, the unfinished notebook where he'd drawn the white globes, over and over and over. The paper inside was soaked with obsessive fingerprints.

And then he left.

He didn’t ask for a pass. Didn’t check the hallway. Just walked out of the classroom with his hair sticking to his forehead like wet spider legs, down the stairs, out into the blurring grey of the world.

The rain hit like fists. No rhythm, just relentless. It felt like the sky was mad at him too — maybe for being born.

He didn’t know where he was going. That wasn’t new. Jack hadn’t known where he was going for years , not since the chase (the other Chase) had left him hollow, not since the monks had grown up and grown apart from him, and certainly not since his mind had begun cracking like an old monitor screen. He screamed. No— he shrieked, the kind of scream that tore itself from his ribs, drenched in mucus and grief, the kind of scream that tasted like broken batteries.

It echoed off the brick and glass and didn’t sound human.

He fell to his knees. His bag hit the pavement with a splat. He wanted to cry but he was already crying. He wanted to stop but it felt too good, too true to stop. The world was thick and blurry and so goddamn loud, and somewhere in the back of his skull, Good Jack was whispering again:
Calm down. They won’t take you seriously if you fall apart.
They’ll put you away.
You’re disgusting.
They were right.

But louder than that now… was the silence.

A presence.

He didn’t look up, couldn’t — his nose dripping, his hair tangled, his glasses fogged up from the breath he forgot to hold in. But he felt it.

The hand.

Gloved in white.

Not warm, but steady. No tremble. It touched his, just a touch — and Jack startled, half expecting claws, or worse, some pitying adult with an umbrella and a Jesus pamphlet.

But no.
It was only a red umbrella.
Red with white lines.
Held out in offering.

And something else — something impossibly old in his bones — stirred. He couldn’t look up. Couldn’t.

But the globe... it had to be. That white figure, that same faceless kindness from his sketches, that abstract ghost he didn’t want to name. He could feel tears running hot again because he knew — somewhere —he had met this being before. This wasn’t just a dream made flesh. It was someone .

“Wait—” he croaked, but already the figure was walking away. Their footsteps didn't splash like his. No, they moved like a reflection walking away on the surface of still water. He couldn’t follow. Didn’t know how.

By the time he had the strength to wipe his nose and drag himself up from the sidewalk, they were gone.

But the umbrella remained. Still open. Still red. Still shielding him.

And for the first time that day — maybe that month — Jack felt the rain wasn’t as heavy anymore. It was still falling, yes, but it no longer crushed. It cooled.

His voice shook as he whispered, “Thank you…”

No one answered.

But the streetlights flickered on, and Jack Spicer — trembling, feral, and soaking wet — picked up the umbrella and walked into the storm, not knowing it had already begun to pass.

“Kimiko, what did you do?”

Raimundo’s voice broke the hush of the Temple’s antechamber. His shoulders were tense, his expression unsure — not angry, not yet. Omi and Clay stood nearby, silent for once, watching the faint blue shimmer that hovered above the open scroll. The Shen Gong Wu had activated again… no, pulsed, like something breathing in distress. That had never happened before. The wind rattled outside the temple walls.

Kimiko kept her back to them, eyes fixed on the transmission console she had assembled out of scrap circuits and a half-dead laptop. She hadn't said anything for a while.

“I asked for help,” she finally replied.

“You what ?” Raimundo took a step forward.

“I found Jack.”

Omi frowned. “You contacted Jack Spicer? The very Jack Spicer who allied himself with Wuya and other notorious villains and—”

“I said I found him, not that I handed him the Wu.”

She turned, her expression unreadable. Tired maybe. Or afraid to show she was afraid.

“He's… not okay. He's not with Chase. He’s not with anyone. He’s broken. And if what we’ve seen around the city is just the beginning…” Her voice cracked a little, “We might need someone who knows how to build things out of nothing.”

Raimundo rubbed the back of his neck. “So you messaged him, out of nowhere?”

“I sent a scroll. I didn’t say it was from me , just… we needed help.” She paused. “I didn’t expect him to answer. But I hoped.”

Silence.

Clay finally spoke. “We’ve all felt it. Somethin’s stirrin’. People disappearin’, magic actin’ up like it’s got a fever… Maybe we do need someone like Spicer.”

Omi nodded slowly. “Desperation is not strategy… but it can be motivation.”

Kimiko looked at the glowing scroll again. It had stopped pulsing, but there was something… residual, as though it was still listening.

“The thing is,” she whispered, “I didn’t track him down because I thought he could save us. I… I just didn’t want him to be alone when everything starts to collapse.”

Raimundo exhaled, his gaze softening. “Then we’d better find him before the world does.”

Omi stepped forward, his small hands clasped behind his back, chin slightly raised with a gravity beyond his years. “Jack Spicer may be a coward… and a backstabbing person…” he began, the words still careful, “but even I remember the time he tried to be good.”

He looked between them, the flickering scrolllight painting gentle shadows over his round face. “He did not fail because he was evil. He failed because he was frightened — frightened that if he tried to be good and failed, it would prove he was nothing at all. He only returned to being bad because it was what he knew… and what we let him return to.”

There was silence for a breath. Then Clay tipped his hat back just slightly, his gaze distant, as though watching rain fall on some forgotten plain.

“Reckon we’ve all seen it now,” he said quietly. “Ain’t just Jack’s ghosts risin’. Something dark’s rollin’ in over the world, and it ain’t pickin’ sides.” He looked at Kimiko, then Raimundo. “Maybe it’s time we stop thinkin’ in heroes and villains, and start thinkin’ in survivors. If there ain’t a world left to fight for, then what the heck are we even defendin’?”

The Shen Gong Wu pulsed faintly again on the table, as if echoing agreement — or warning. The Temple groaned under the weight of distant thunder.

Kimiko drew her jacket closer to her, the chill of something unspoken passing through her bones.

“Then we track him,” she said, more firmly now. “Not as a criminal. As an ally. Because if we don’t find him…” Her voice dipped. “We might lose more than just him.”

They finally flew on Dojo to search that magic font until…

The air shifted.

Dojo flapped once, twice — then steadied mid-hover with a nervous shudder rippling down his scales. “Uh… guys?” His voice trembled. “This is where the town should be.”

The monks looked down. Below them, nothing. Not ruins. Not smoldering earth. Nothing. Just a blank, humming flatness where trees bowed away from an invisible center, as if recoiling in instinctive terror.

“This… this can’t be right,” Kimiko said, pulling out her tablet with a flick of the wrist, her brows furrowed. “The coordinates are exact. There was a town here. Five hundred people. Residential zone, schools, clinics— I pulled the local infrastructure just this morning, there’s records —!”

“And now it is gone,” Omi said slowly, his eyes narrowed. “Not destroyed. Not decayed. Gone. ”

They all felt it — the buzzing, electric taste of the air, like static rising in their lungs. The kind of pressure that didn't push against skin but pressed into memory, folding it wrong.

Clay’s jaw was tight. “Y’all feel that?” he muttered. “Like the air’s tryin’ to spit us out?”

Dojo let out a low, uncertain growl, his long body shifting uneasily beneath them. “It’s not just energy,” he said. “It’s resistance. This whole space… it’s like it don’t want us here. Like it’s remembering we shouldn’t be looking.”

Kimiko stood slowly, her gaze scanning the vast, blank plain, her fingers cold around the edge of the tablet. “What kind of magic does this?”

There was no answer. Raimundo glanced at her, his eyes stormy.

“Maybe the wrong kind,” he said quietly. Then louder, “We need to land. Get a closer look.”

Dojo hesitated, clearly uneasy, but dipped toward the earth. As soon as they approached the outermost edge, the wind snapped — not violently, but precisely. A hard twist. The air pushed them back, no longer just humming but screaming in a pitch just out of reach, just inside their teeth. Dojo recoiled mid-dive, wings contorting with the strain.

“I can’t!” he barked. “Something’s locking me out — this whole perimeter’s laced with a... with a reversal , like a rejection loop. It’s magic, but not like anything I’ve seen.”

They hovered in silence, staring at where a town once existed.

Then Omi said, very softly, “What if this is not a disappearance? What if it is… a warning?”

The others turned toward him.

“A message,” he continued. “From something older than us. Something that is waking. And does not wish to be seen.”

Kimiko’s fingers trembled. “Do you think Chase knows…?”

Raimundo clenched his fists. “We don't know what he's gotten into. But if this is connected to him …”

“Then we’d better find him,” Clay muttered, eyes still locked on the blank horizon, “ before it finds us. ”

And the Shen Gong Wu at Kimiko’s side pulsed once more, harder than before — not eager this time, but something that made her afraid.

And the Shen Gong Wu at Kimiko’s side pulsed once more, harder than before — not eager this time, but afraid.

Back at the temple, no one spoke immediately.

The moment they stepped from Dojo’s back and into the wooden courtyard — worn now, moss growing between the boards — silence gripped them like a net. A silence that wasn’t peace, but dread disguised as quiet. The kind of hush that settles over ruins before anyone dares admit the loss.

Master Fung had not said anything yet. He stood near the threshold, hands behind his back, his face shadowed by the slanting sun and years of silent vigilance. Even he seemed older now — not weaker, but weathered in a way no storm alone could explain.

Omi was the first to break the tension, clearing his throat.

“If entire towns vanish,” he said, quietly, “then we must assume this is not targeted. It is a spreading — a sickness of the world. A wrongness in the roots of the balance.”

“Yeah,” Clay said. “And if it can take a place like that … then there ain’t no safe place left.”

Raimundo sat down heavily on one of the outer stone steps, staring out at the courtyard as if he were trying to imagine what would vanish first. “We can’t wait for this to get worse,” he muttered. “We can’t wait for it to come here.”

Kimiko pulled the Shen Gong Wu from her belt, holding it in both “I ran diagnostics,” she said, voice rough. “Even using tech on a Wu is unstable now. Magic and systems… they’re starting to resist one another. It’s like both want to be dominant, and neither will give.”

Master Fung stepped forward at last.

“I have felt it, too,” he said softly, finally breaking the still air. “Even the ancient scrolls resist opening. Dojo has had visions but cannot remember them. Some of the guardians who once protected the temples no longer respond. The world is slipping out of alignment — but not toward evil.” He paused. “Toward something... outside of that spectrum.”

Raimundo shook his head. “So what do we do? We’re four people. Four. And we don’t even know what we’re fighting.”

“We ask for help,” Omi said firmly, crossing his arms. “We already have. We sent a scroll to Spicer.”

Kimiko looked down. Her voice was subdued. “I didn’t tell before, because… I wasn’t sure. But the school where he is — or was — it’s not responding either. I don’t know where he went after getting the message.”

Clay frowned. “Wait. You mean he ran after gettin’ a call for help?”

Kimiko hesitated. “No. I mean... he disappeared.”

There was a silence, heavier this time.

“Do we know why?” Master Fung asked gently.

Kimiko met his gaze. “I think he was scared. But I also think... something found him.”

Raimundo rubbed his face with both hands. “So we’re back to that question. Who else?”

Omi lifted his head, ever the one to push forward, even when the cliff was invisible.

“Jermaine,” he offered. “We should contact Jermaine. He may not have trained as long as us, but he has proven worthy. And most importantly — he cares .”

Master Fung nodded. “A wise choice. He is connected to the spirit of the temple in his own way.”

“And after that?” Clay muttered. “We got Jack, maybe. Jermaine. Who else?”

There was a long pause. The names were few. The reliable ones? Fewer.

“Not Chase,” Raimundo said quickly. “We don’t even know if he’s on our side anymore.”

Omi spoke slower this time, as if testing the edges of the thought. “If Chase Young wants to help... he will appear. He always does. But if he does not—”

“Then we don’t waste time knocking,” Kimiko said, coldly.

“What about Wuya?” Clay asked, though the words barely left his throat.

“No,” said Master Fung.

The room fell deeper into tension.

“She is not stable, nor trustworthy,” he continued. “Her ambitions rise with disorder. She may seek to use this disruption.”

“Yeah,” Raimundo muttered. “If she hasn’t already.”

“Then the rest?” Clay asked. “Tubbimura? Katnappe? Vlad?”

“Katnappe’s last known post was some influencer garbage about opening a new ‘Heylin Fashion’ brand,” Kimiko said, deadpan. “She probably thinks this global magic collapse is just a PR stunt.”

“And Tubbimura would sell us all for an ancient sushi roll,” Raimundo added. “Face it. We’ve got who we’ve got.”

“But…” Omi’s voice softened. “Should we not try? Even small help, from even strange places, is better than none. We cannot afford to turn away allies.”

Kimiko rubbed her eyes. “We’d need leverage. We’d need something that made helping us worth it.”

And for a long moment, nobody said anything. Until Dojo — quiet all this time — raised his head.

“I don’t know what’s causing this,” he said softly, “but I’ve felt this kind of rupture before. It’s like the world wants to forget us. All of us. The Wu, the monks, the heylin — everyone. Like the rules of reality are changing. And if we don’t remember ourselves... no one else will.”

They looked around. At the ancient stonework. The fading scrolls. The cloudy sky over a temple that felt less like a home and more like an echo.

Kimiko gripped the scroll harder.

“Then we remember,” she said. “We make them remember. Because if we don’t—”

“Then we vanish,” Raimundo finished.

Omi nodded solemnly.

“And there will be no story left to tell.”

Chapter Text

The paper roll sat on his nightstand, thin and harmless in shape, but somehow heavy in the way it seemed to occupy the whole room. He had left it there deliberately, as if ignoring it might make it forget him, but that never worked. Not with the voice.

Good Jack, it said, not in praise but as if ticking off an item on a list. Good Jack will take it back. Good Jack will help the monks. They’re waiting. You know they’re waiting.

“They’re not—” Jack’s voice came out raw, cracked from disuse. “They’re not even thinking about me. They’ve got their own stuff. I’m not—”

They need you. You saw their faces. That roll is theirs. It’s important. More important than you sitting here doing nothing.

His fingers twitched toward it before he caught himself. “It’s not mine to fix,” he said, louder this time, as if raising his voice might drown the other one. “They’ll figure it out. I’m not—”

Good Jack doesn’t leave things undone. Good Jack doesn’t make people wait. Good Jack knows it’s wrong to keep it.

“It’s not wrong!” He startled himself with the force of it. “It’s not wrong, it’s just… I don’t know what to do, okay?”

The voice didn’t pause. You take it back. You go. You get up, you put on your shoes—

Jack pressed his palms over his ears. It never helped. The voice was inside, stitched into the fabric of his own thoughts, so that he could never quite tell where he ended and it began. His chest felt tight, breath shallow, the whole room sharpening in on the paper roll like a lens.

If you were better, it said softly now, you’d already be gone.

He fumbled for the pill bottle, rattled it open. Two ovals into his mouth, water warm and metallic from the glass. He swallowed hard. Slowly, slowly, the voice loosened its grip, like fingers unpeeling from his collar. Still there, but blurred, as though speaking from another room.

The tension in his jaw eased. His eyes wandered — anywhere but the roll — and caught on the umbrella propped against the wall. Red and white stripes. The stranger’s white gloves still on the handle.

He tried to remember their face, but only recalled rain in his hair, the smell of clean soap, and the pressure of the umbrella handle pressed into his palms. No questions, no judgment. Just given.

It was strange, how a stranger’s small kindness could survive in his chest like a warm coal, even through days like this. He thought — distantly, like through fog — that maybe he ought to find them again. Not for answers. Just… to say thank you.

ack murmured, eyes unfocused, voice barely above the hum of the rain outside.
Yes, Good Jack replied, slow and warm, like approval dripping honey-thick into the cracks of his mind. They were kind. You could be kind back.
“I could,” Jack whispered, lips twitching in a faint, strange smile. “Give it back. Or… maybe just thank them properly.”
Yes. A kindness answered with a kindness. That’s what good Jack does.
Jack nodded once—too quick, too sharp—and a passing shadow of self-awareness told him he must look like a lunatic, carrying on a one-sided conversation with air. But the thought didn’t stick. He was already slipping into that quiet, mechanical state where the body moved and the mind only occasionally dropped in to check the progress.

His modus operandi was always the same when the voice had receded into satisfaction—an eerie calmness after the static. He’d rise in measured increments, no wasted movements, no hesitation. The door to the washroom. The turn of the knob. Lights flicking on in perfect sequence. He never registered the way his bare feet padded against cold tile, or the sound of the water rushing into the basin, or even the slight tremor in his hands as he undid the buttons. It was all routine muscle memory: strip, shower, scrub until steam blurred the edges of the mirror. Hair combed back, uniform immaculate—creased at the sleeves, collar sitting just so. The faint scent of starch and soap clung to him like armor. Somewhere between the shower and buttoning the jacket, his consciousness blinked back in, like surfacing from a dream.

He didn’t remember where he’d set the scroll. Good. He didn’t want to remember. Its presence gnawed at him in the background—its weight always a threat—but for now, his focus settled on the umbrella, resting on the counter like a treasure. The red-and-white spiral seemed impossibly bright against the muted gray of the morning light, and when he picked it up, he cradled it in both hands as though it might shatter. The thought of the stranger’s niceness—simple, uncalculated—pressed gently at something soft in his chest.

It feels good, doesn’t it? Good Jack’s voice coiled around the thought like a cat curling into a warm spot.
“…Yeah,” Jack muttered, thumb brushing the smooth handle. “Feels… good.”
That’s what you hold on to. Not the scroll. This.
He let himself believe it, even if it was only for the time it took to draw a single steady breath. With the umbrella in his hand, he could pretend—just for now—that the scroll didn’t exist. That maybe, just maybe, he wasn’t already in too deep.

Apparently, somehow, this day wasn’t that bad—though, at certain moments, the pressure of memory had coiled itself around his mind with the slow insistence of a muscle that refuses to unclench. The monks—those monks—faces blurred by time yet sharpened in their judgment—had appeared in fragments, not as a scene, not even as an event, but as a presence, a heavy shadow moving across the inner walls of his skull. He had not seen them in years; he could not recall with precision any single conversation or gesture, yet the residue was there: the certainty that whatever he had done, however he had acted, he had been—he was —a failure. And this, more than the absence of memory, was what hurt: that no matter which fork in the road he took, the path seemed to curve back to the same barren clearing. So he had stayed away. From them. From anything. From that version of himself.

It didn’t help that, between classes, whenever his stomach sank or his pulse began to race with that slow, invisible dread, the weather seemed to register it too—as though the sky were not just a sky but an accomplice to his moods. A gray film slid over the daylight, the air grew denser, and, once or twice, thunder broke somewhere far enough to be ambiguous. His classmates had commented on it—some amused, some annoyed—wondering aloud if a storm was building or if it was just “one of those weird days.” Nobody knew why. Not even Jack. And that was what unsettled him most—he couldn’t tell whether this was coincidence or punishment, or whether the entire notion of linking the two was absurd. Still, through it, Good Jack was there— still talking to him .

“You’re doing better than you think,” Good Jack said, with that maddening gentleness that could only come from someone who knew .

“I’m not,” Jack muttered under his breath, pretending to straighten his notes as a classmate brushed past.

“You are ,” Good Jack insisted. “You noticed the umbrella. You cared enough to think about returning it. That’s not nothing.”

“That’s… basic human decency,” Jack whispered, the words barely audible. “I’m not exactly—”

“You didn’t have to. You chose to. That’s the difference.”

It was still weird—having him there, sounding almost pleased, as if this smallest of gestures, this thought of returning a stranger’s umbrella, was some great moral victory. And what was stranger still was that, for the first time in longer than he cared to measure, Jack could almost mimic that tone. Not perfectly—never perfectly—but he caught himself aligning with it for a breath or two, and the realization startled him, like catching a glimpse of his own reflection in a shop window and not recognizing the person looking back.

Class ended, and with it the campus emptied into that slow afternoon lull, where the voices and footsteps fade just enough to make the silence obvious. The umbrella was still with him, balanced in his hand with a peculiar lightness that didn’t match its weight. And suddenly—without deciding, without planning—the idea of going outside the campus to look for the stranger who had given it to him seemed… possible. Foolish, maybe. A little impossible. But possible enough to give him that small current of energy that felt almost like hope.

He walked in autopilot, the way he always did when his thoughts refused to settle. His modus operandi in these moments was mechanical: first, the mind detaches; then the body follows a prewritten script. His steps took him down the hall, through the turn, past the vending machine, into the restroom. Hands washed. Hair fixed. Not a drop of water left on his sleeves. Then the change into his uniform—already immaculate from its place in his bag, smoothed of every crease before it even touched his shoulders. Everything aligned without him needing to think about it. By the time he was dressed, shoes polished, collar straight, he realized he could not recall a single sound or sight between leaving the classroom and standing here now, ready.

The scroll—the one thing he wished he could forget—still pulsed faintly in his thoughts, like a splinter under the skin. But in his hands, the umbrella rested with a tenderness that belonged to someone else entirely. Maybe the stranger’s kindness had left a trace. Maybe Good Jack was right—though he wouldn’t admit it aloud.

“See?” Good Jack’s voice came again, warm now, almost smug. “Not such a bad day.”

“Don’t start,” Jack murmured, stepping toward the door.

“I’m just saying—you could let yourself believe that.”

“Maybe,” he said, too softly for anyone but Good Jack to hear.

And so he stepped out, the umbrella a quiet promise in his hand, and the faintest, most reluctant hope pulling him forward.

Even though Jack had walked these streets over and over — the very same stretch where the umbrella had been pressed into his hands — the person who had given it to him was nowhere to be found. The corner looked the same; the chipped curb still leaned toward the gutter, the lamplight still bled weakly through a foggy halo, but there was no trace of that fleeting, impossible kindness. Still, he muttered under his breath as he went along, small encouragements, half-murmured affirmations he hardly realized he was speaking — the sort of words Good Jack would have said, precise in tone and strangely gentle, as if they’d been rehearsed in another mind. In truth, the longer it went on, the more it felt as though the balance had shifted, as though Good Jack now moved through the streets while the Jack everyone else knew was left somewhere behind, trailing like a shadow that could no longer keep pace. Jack himself wasn’t sure at which moment the switch had happened, only that he had been listening to a voice that wasn’t quite his and yet wore his own inflections, that he had been nodding along to thoughts that felt both alien and intimately his own. And so, day after day, he searched. It became part of the clockwork of his existence — classes, corridors, the quiet corridors in his mind where Good Jack still offered small remarks, then the streets again, eyes scanning for a figure that might or might not be real.

One afternoon, the search brought him near the school gates. The day had slipped into that pale, uncertain light that hangs before dusk when the rain has been coming and going in broken intervals, now heavy, now thin. At that moment it was only a delicate shower, enough to paint the air with a damp sheen, the sound of it softening all other noises. Jack stood just outside the ironwork, holding the umbrella from the stranger with the same careful grip he had given it on the first day, a grip that made the object seem less a tool against the weather than something entrusted to him. His gaze wandered over the empty street until a voice, sudden and unannounced, startled him out of his quiet vigil.

“Jack?”

He turned, and there was Calder, also holding an umbrella, his presence solid and strangely grounding in the watery light. Jack felt a muscle he hadn’t been aware of relaxing, as if the appearance of someone familiar shifted the weather itself — the rain softened almost instantly, its rhythm against the umbrellas slowing to a hush. Calder stepped closer, the water flicking off his coat, and his eyes narrowed in a way that was not suspicion exactly, but the kind of focused noticing that left little room to hide.

“What are you doing out here?” Calder asked.

Jack blinked, mind briefly catching on the simplest possible truth before his mouth supplied it: “Waiting to see someone.”

The other’s gaze dropped to the umbrella — the stranger’s umbrella — and lingered there a fraction too long, as though reading it like a line of handwriting in an old letter. “Someone?”

Jack nodded once, the answer feeling both absurd and inevitable.

For a few seconds Calder seemed to weigh whether to say more, and then, without shifting his tone, asked, “Are you worried about the mime?”

At that, Jack’s brows drew together; confusion flickered across his face like a shadow in water. “The mime?”

“Yes,” Calder said, and this time there was something in his voice that suggested he thought Jack should already know. “You know — the mime who keeps showing up outside the gates sometimes. Or close to them. Does those little street performances. The students like him. He hasn’t been around lately.”

Jack stared, the rain hushing down between them, his mind trying to wrap itself around the thought of this mime and the stranger with the umbrella as though they might be one and the same.

Calder, meanwhile, shifted the folder he carried under his arm — the thin packet of papers Jack recognized, with a vague prickling, as the ones they kept about him, about his state of mind, about what the school thought they knew of his thoughts. He glanced toward the gates again. “I was here to give the office some documents. Your file was in the batch.” A pause, then: “It’s not bad. Just… they’re keeping track. That’s all.”

Jack said nothing, only stood with the umbrella, the rain lightening into the kind of drizzle that almost vanished between drops, and somewhere in his mind Good Jack murmured something — approval, or hope, or perhaps both — that made the real Jack feel, for just a second, that maybe the day wasn’t so bad after all.

Jack shifted under the soft drizzle, the umbrella damp and heavy in his hands, red and white stripes smeared with tiny rivulets of rainwater. His mind was a storm of hesitations, the fragments of Good Jack whispering, nudging him toward thoughts he was too afraid to voice out loud, urging connections he almost felt but could not name. Calder’s presence, patient and silent, pressed against that inner tumult with a subtle steadiness, like a quiet current under a boiling river. For a long stretch, Jack said nothing, muttering only to the phantom voice that teased him constantly, Good Jack’s cadence urging him to speak, to say what he felt, to bridge the fissure of his own thoughts.

Finally, after a hesitation that made his teeth ache from clenching, Jack muttered, voice brittle and low, “Do… do you think he’s okay? The mime?” The words felt foreign and half-formed, trembling in the rain-soaked air. Good Jack nudged him with impatient insistence, whispering that he already knew, that the memory was there, something familiar, yet Jack’s lips could not quite shape the truth of it, and so the question emerged like a thin, shaky thread.

Calder’s steps slowed, his gaze steady on Jack. He considered the words carefully, then offered a soft, reassuring smile that seemed to push the storm in Jack’s chest back a fraction. “Most likely,” he said gently, his voice carrying warmth against the cold drizzle. “The weather probably kept him away. Not like he’s… missing or anything serious.”

Relief surged briefly, and Jack muttered to himself, answering Good Jack at the same time, “Oh… maybe. I… guess… yeah.” The two voices mingled, one real, one spectral, one anxious, one coaxing, circling each other like twin reflections in a fractured mirror. He took a shuddering breath and felt a little of the tension seep out of his shoulders.

Calder tilted his umbrella, leaning slightly closer. “Was that why you were worried the other day? You didn’t show up in your usual spot… I noticed.”

Jack blinked rapidly, muttering, first in denial, first to himself and then under his breath, “No… not that… I… it wasn’t—” But Good Jack cut in, persistent, almost teasing: Yes, it was. Admit it. You were thinking about him. Jack’s lips pressed together, then parted finally to whisper, “Yes… okay… maybe…” His voice broke halfway, almost swallowed by the rain.

Calder’s eyes softened, patient, understanding. He gave a small nod and a quiet, steady smile. “You’re a kind person, Jack. That’s all. That’s enough.”

Jack froze at the words, heart hammering as if someone had pressed a palm to his chest. Relief pooled slowly, quietly, a warm current in the cold and damp. He let himself breathe out a shaky laugh, muttering softly under his umbrella, “Kind… okay… yeah.” Good Jack’s voice hummed approval inside his skull, approving the acknowledgment, nudging him gently toward a fragile confidence he hadn’t felt in weeks.

The rain softened further, droplets falling in scattered patterns across the red-and-white canvas of his umbrella. Jack’s fingers tightened around the handle almost absentmindedly, a small, grounding anchor as he felt the first faint stirrings of ease. He looked up at Calder briefly, the words sticking in his throat: “Thanks… for… noticing. For… waiting.”

Calder’s smile deepened, reassuring and calm, and he replied simply, “Of course. I’m here. You’re not alone.”

Jack nodded, muttering to Good Jack at the same time, “Not… alone… yeah… maybe I’m… not.” The voices inside him wove together, one coaxing, one echoing, both overlapping yet separate, a dissonance that somehow finally felt less threatening under Calder’s quiet patience. The city around them blurred slightly in the rain, puddles reflecting distorted lights, the cold and drizzle fading into something that almost felt like warmth.

Jack’s shoulders relaxed fractionally, and the tension that had knotted his chest all day seemed to loosen. For the first time, he didn’t feel entirely trapped inside his own mind, the jumble of thoughts still present but quieter, less insistent. He muttered again, voice low, but steadier this time: “I… I think I can… wait a little… longer.”

Calder’s response was simple, almost matter-of-fact, yet it carried weight enough to anchor him: “Take all the time you need, Jack. That’s perfectly fine.”

The rain continued its soft descent, but Jack felt lighter, the umbrella still clutched in his hands, and somewhere in the mixture of spectral voices and the steady human presence, he allowed himself to hope that he might not always be fractured, and that maybe, just maybe, he could trust another person enough to step a little further into the world.

It kept raining and people were starting to search for shelter from it, and of course that would also be the case for a certain person…

The rain again—always the rain—how it seemed to crawl over the glass of the cafeteria window as though it had nothing better to do than remind him of the way water clung, obstinately, to skin and clothes, dampening not only fabric but also spirit. He had never liked the rain, and now he despised it, though he could, with a simple gesture, call forth an invisible umbrella out of compressed air and walk beneath it like a prince of silence. But lately his tricks did not answer him as they used to—something had dulled in him, a kind of inner stiffness, as if the air itself had grown weary of obeying. He sat there, half-drenched, moving his hands without a word, miming the opening of an umbrella that failed to materialize, only for a few children at the corner table to giggle at his pantomime without understanding the small tragedy embedded within it.

Disappearances. Always the newspapers spoke of nothing else, dark print smudged by his damp fingers whenever he leafed through discarded copies left on benches or trash bins. People vanished, and that was the headline, louder and larger than any of his small thefts or clever robberies could ever be. Once, his mischief had been enough—snatching watches, wallets, or pastries with a flourish, making bystanders gasp at the audacity of a mime who stole invisibly, laughing behind his painted mouth. It had been a performance, a kind of street theatre where crime was only the backdrop to the applause he craved. But now? The column inches belonged to other mysteries, heavier than his tricks, and his stage felt stolen.

He stirred his hands again in little waves, as though brushing dust off an invisible tabletop, his thoughts drifting to a time when the world had seemed sharper, alive, electric with possibility. That must have been… what, four, maybe five years ago? When he had first seen the boy—no, not just any boy, that boy, Jack. Something about him had pulled at the edge of his imagination immediately. He had seen so many faces, blank or mocking, but this one was different, carrying within it a chaos of genius and fragility that made Le Mime’s painted grin almost real. They had fought side by side once, or rather, flailed together in one of those desperate scrambles for the Sheng Gong Wu. He remembered the absurdity of it—his fists against his face, the moment of betrayal when the reflection turned against him. He had struck himself, like a fool in his own pantomime, collapsing into unconsciousness with the laughter of fate ringing in his ears.

And when he woke in the hospital, sterile light pressing into his painted eyes, he thought there would be bills, accusations, punishment. But there was only a scrap of paper, ink smudged by hurried fingers, scrawled with a crooked face and a line that carried both mockery and apology: “I’m sorry in the most evil way :( — evil genius.” He could still see it, folded in his memory as though in a pocket, a relic of the boy he had never met again.

Until now.

His hand lifted, without thinking, and traced in the air the curved letters of a name that no one around him could see: J-A-C-K. The gesture hung invisible, dissolving as the rain rattled louder against the windows. He realized, with the same strange clarity that sometimes overtook him when he performed for no one in particular, why he had kept returning these past weeks to the gates of that private, rich school, pretending it was chance, or convenience, or some unconscious habit. He had known, without admitting it, that his stage was there. That somewhere behind those gates, that face might reappear. And hadn’t it? Just a glimpse, enough to set the heart of a silent clown racing again, to remind him that boredom was not permanent.

He clutched the air, as though holding an invisible rose, bowing deeply before the empty chair across from him. Yes, it had to be fate that drew him here again. And perhaps, in the oddest way, the rain too.

The café, with its soft hum of rain outside and the slow, scattered chatter of customers within, seemed to stretch into a stage of memory more than a place of the present. Le Mime, curled in his usual half-exaggerated slump, had been letting the hours drift across him like a dull curtain that refused to rise. Yet now, as his eyes wandered toward the window where droplets gathered into trembling lines before sliding down into disappearance, he realized that this café was not only a shelter from the storm—it was a return, a loop, a re-entrance to something he had already played once before. Yes, of course—how could he not have noticed? It was here that he had first met the boy with too much fire in his hair and eyes, the boy who laughed too loudly at his own cleverness, who made the world feel like it could tip over into chaos at any second. Jack. This was the very stage of that meeting, though it had swollen and changed, grown larger, brighter, more impersonal, as though memory itself had been repainted with more square footage but less intimacy.

And yet his senses had grown restless with it. It was not simply nostalgia—it was that peculiar mix of boredom so thick it could be chewed, of hope faint as a thread barely holding, of something more unnamed that tugged at him like the invisible rope he sometimes mimed for his audiences, pulling him along whether he wished to move or not. Disaster had become his compass; and in this disaster of disappearances and weather too sudden to be chance, he had found himself drawn here, umbrella-less, as if fate insisted he not shield himself.

The memory came back with a start: days ago—or was it weeks?—a sound had cracked through him, someone screaming with a force so raw it pierced like thunder, followed by the collapse into crying, heavy, helpless. He had not turned, not fully. He had seen only flashes—the spill of crimson hair so like Jack’s, though it could not be Jack, not here, not now. He had felt his chest twist into that old, strange ache, and before he knew it, his hand had extended, offering his umbrella, red and white striped like the old sweater he always wore, and then he left, left quickly, afraid to look closer, afraid to confirm anything more than he could bear.

He let out a mime’s sigh, theatrical and long, his body deflating against the glass pane as if he were a balloon robbed of all its air, cheek pressed against the cool surface, arms dangling at odd angles in comic surrender. The rain outside blurred into streaks, into curtains of water sliding endlessly, and he thought—oh, what a beautiful umbrella that passerby had just now, walking quickly under the storm, its bright colors cutting through the gray world. Red with white stripes, so jaunty, so familiar, so—

Le Mime jolted upright, his chair squealing sharply against the floor. His eyes widened, his hands snapping into the air, grasping nothing, shaping the form of realization itself. That umbrella—it was his. The very one he had given away. The same stripes, the same shade of red against the white, unmistakable. His whole body froze in silent exclamation, as though he had been struck across the chest with invisible hands.

And in that moment, without a word, without a sound, the café seemed to hold its breath with him, caught in the sudden suspension of his discovery.

Chapter Text

Jermaine rubbed the back of his neck, shifting from one foot to the other, as though the polished stones of the temple floor were suddenly too slick, too fragile to stand on. His eyes moved between the monks, lingering on each in turn, trying to gather sense from their half-answers, their pauses.

“So—lemme get this straight,” he said finally, his voice carrying that easy rhythm of someone who’d rather joke about it than sink into panic, “the world’s… ending? Like, really ending?”

Kimiko’s hands fluttered a little, palms opening, as if she could catch the right words mid-air. “No—well, not exactly—” she began, but faltered, her brows knitting together, the line between what she wanted to say and what could truly be said collapsing.

Clay, slow and deliberate as always, let his hat tip back just a fraction, the gesture more thoughtful than relaxed. “It ain’t simple, Jermaine. Not somethin’ you put in a couple words without losin’ the meaning. It’s more like… things ain’t holdin’ steady the way they used to.”

Raimundo leaned back against a pillar, arms crossed, the faintest smirk that wasn’t really a smirk twitching on his lips. “Depends how you look at it, man. Some people would say ‘ending,’ some people would say ‘changing.’ Guess it depends how much you like the way things are now.”

Omi, however, stood with hands pressed together as if in solemn prayer, his round eyes wide, his voice as absolute as a gong. “Yes, Jermaine. The world is unraveling, though not like a ball falling apart into strings, but more as if the strings themselves forget they were ever tied.”

Jermaine gave a long exhale, shoulders rising and falling with exaggerated weight, and laughed softly, though it carried no joy. “Man… I thought finals week was the end of the world. You know? Last championship game, last exam, sweat dripping down, coach yellin’… That felt like doom to me. But this? This is—this is world-end end. Like no reset button, no ‘see you next season.’”

He shook his head, looking down at his sneakers, as though they might give him steadier ground than the monks could. “Thing is—I didn’t even notice. Where I live? Everything’s the same. Folks go to work, play ball, come back home. Nobody talks about the sky bein’ wrong or people disappearin’. Not even a whisper.”

His words seemed to hang in the air, sticky as the rain outside. The monks exchanged glances—quick, sharp, each measuring something the others might have missed. Kimiko’s eyes softened with concern; Clay’s narrowed, thoughtful; Raimundo’s smirk slipped away, and Omi’s brows arched higher still.

Kimiko finally said, almost under her breath, “So it’s only here… near the temple.”

Clay added, “And the places close enough to it. Like a circle, but not a circle we can see.”

Raimundo frowned, tapping his arm with two fingers as if knocking on a door that wouldn’t open. “Makes you wonder if the disappearances, the Wu misbehaving, even the memory gaps… all that is local, not global.”

And Omi, with the finality of someone who believed truth could be spoken into being, intoned: “Yes. It is as if the world’s ending begins only where we stand, and nowhere else. And yet… does that not make it even more dangerous, for who would believe us until the unraveling reaches their own doorstep?”

Jermaine lifted his head again, eyes wide, a smile caught between disbelief and dread. “So what—you’re telling me the world might only be ending… for you guys? For us? And the rest of the planet’s still playin’ ball like nothing’s wrong?”

The silence after was heavy, not because no one had an answer, but because each feared the answer was already clear.

The monks sat in a half-circle, as though by some invisible agreement their bodies had aligned in that formation, the stone floor cool beneath them, the faint draft of the temple whispering like a reminder that outside, things were indeed shifting. They had been speaking, circling around the same thoughts, though none of them dared to say aloud what was truly sinking in: should Jermaine know? Should he be burdened with what even they, trained monks, could barely comprehend? Kimiko kept her hands folded tightly, her nails digging into the skin of her palm as if that discipline of silence could compensate for the tremor in her voice. Clay scratched at his hat, his long drawl slowed by uncertainty rather than laziness. Raimundo leaned back, restless, tapping his fingers against the floor, wanting to dismiss it all with a joke but unable to find one. And Omi, dear Omi, looked as though he carried centuries in the crease of his brow.

It was Jermaine, however, who broke the fragile circle of hesitation. He inhaled sharply, his shoulders rising, his gaze steady even though confusion lingered there.
“Look,” he began, his words ringing in the chamber with more weight than the monks expected from him, “the fact that I didn’t see it doesn’t mean it ain’t real. Just ‘cause where I live the streets look the same, the ball still bounces, my mom still yells at me to take out the trash—just ‘cause it looks normal doesn’t mean nothing’s happening. If it’s starting here, with you all, then it means sooner or later it’s gonna be knocking at my door. My family’s door. And what am I supposed to do? Pretend it won’t reach us? Nah. That’s not me.”

Omi opened his mouth as if to counter, but Jermaine pressed on, his voice gathering momentum, finding its place against the hesitations that weighed on the others.
“I’m not gonna abandon them. I couldn’t. You hear me? If the world is bending, breaking, twisting—whatever it’s doing—then it’ll bend, break, twist itself all the way to Brooklyn. And when it does, I’ll be there, and I’d rather already know what I’m up against than get caught blind. You guys get me? I want to know. I need to know. So don’t stand there holding back like I can’t handle it. I can. If I can handle playing finals with a busted ankle and still not let the team down, you better believe I can handle this.”

There was silence. Kimiko lowered her gaze, guilt flickering across her face. Clay tilted his hat back, considering the truth in Jermaine’s words. Raimundo exhaled, finally breaking his own stillness, his hand rubbing against his jaw as if to buy himself time.

Jermaine leaned forward, elbows on his knees, eyes sharp now, not hesitant but insistent.
“Listen. I know you guys feel it too. The Wu, the air, whatever it is—it’s wrong. But don’t think you’re doing me a favor by keeping me in the dark. ‘Cause darkness? That’s what makes you trip. Knowledge? That’s what lets you see where you’re walking. So I’m asking you straight: what’s the plan? What do we do ? ‘Cause I’m not sitting this out. I’m in. You hear me? I’m in.”

Omi, stirred by those words, nodded with sudden fervor, almost relieved by Jermaine’s conviction, as if his own burden had been lightened.
“Your spirit is most admirable,” Omi said, voice trembling between pride and fear. “Truly, to face the unknown with such courage is a lesson even monks must remember.”

Kimiko’s lips curved into the faintest, weary smile, as though Jermaine’s insistence had cut through her own doubt. Clay murmured, “He’s right… reckon you can’t fight somethin’ if you keep pretendin’ it ain’t there.”

Raimundo finally straightened up, flicking his hair back, his smirk not playful but resolved. “Guess we don’t have a choice then, huh? He’s in. So, we need to figure out the next move.”

The silence that followed Raimundo’s words was almost ceremonial. For a moment, the weight of what had been spoken seemed to press the very walls of the temple, until Kimiko, calm but deliberate, began to speak.

She drew in a breath, steadying herself, and then, one after the other, they laid everything bare before Jermaine: the way certain villages had been swallowed whole by the shifting, places that once stood firm now nothing more than hollow ground or dissolving fragments in memory. Raimundo added, with a hint of bitterness, how landmarks he once counted on to guide his travels had become mirages, here one day, gone the next. Kimiko, more analytical, explained how the shifts weren’t random—they followed patterns, almost like a design, though twisted and hostile. Clay leaned forward, voice grave, describing how even the strongest, most solid landscapes had betrayed them, fields turning to nothing under his boots.

Jermaine listened to every word without interrupting. His eyes moved between them, but his face remained still, unreadable. He did not fidget, did not lean away. He simply absorbed it, as though his body were the vessel for all their truths. When Kimiko, at last, spoke of even the temple’s own walls trembling at times, Jermaine let the silence stretch.

Finally, he spoke, voice low but unwavering.
“So all of this is real. People disappearing, places gone. And I’m your only ally?”

The weight of the question made the monks glance at each other. Omi, shoulders stiff, answered with a solemn nod.
“For now, yes. Only you. But we will reach out to other monks, consult with the ones who may know more. The Xiaolin Temple does not stand alone forever.”

Jermaine tilted his head, his brow tightening in a faint frown.
“That’s… surprising. I’d figured you’d have a list of people lined up already. Seems like something this big shouldn’t fall on just you kids—and me.”

There was a pause. Raimundo crossed his arms, leaning back with that casual air that always made his words sound lighter than they really were, though his smirk was more strained than cocky.
“Yeah, about that. We don’t exactly have the luxury of a full army. But Kimiko—” He tipped his chin toward her, his voice sharpening. “—sent out a roll. To a certain evil boy genius.”

The words landed like a stone tossed into a pond. Jermaine’s eyes flicked to Kimiko, searching her expression. She didn’t flinch. Instead, she straightened, her posture precise, as though rehearsed for just such scrutiny.

“I tracked him down,” she said firmly. “It wasn’t easy. He doesn’t exactly leave a trail anymore. But I managed. And I asked for help. I haven’t heard back, but…” Her lips tightened, then she exhaled. “He doesn’t seem… evil anymore. Not the way he was. Something’s changed.”

Omi, who had been following the conversation with an almost childlike eagerness, brightened, nodding quickly.
“That is most excellent news! To turn away from evil is the highest path of honor. Perhaps this genius has finally found his way.”

Jermaine, though, didn’t look convinced. He folded his arms, turning slightly away as though tasting the thought before swallowing it. “Or maybe he’s just waiting for the right moment. People don’t just switch sides like that. At least, not without a reason.”

Clay, scratching the side of his jaw, broke the moment with a drawl that cut clean through the tension.
“Well, reckon it ain’t like he was ever real good at bein’ evil anyway. Guy couldn’t hold a candle to the big shots.” He let out a dry chuckle, shaking his head. “If he’s finally quittin’, then it’s probably for the best. World wasn’t exactly tremblin’ in fear of him.”

That earned a small laugh from Raimundo, though it was half under his breath. “Yeah, I’ll give you that.”

Kimiko’s gaze, however, stayed steady on Jermaine. “Whether or not he was good at it doesn’t matter. What matters is that he could be another ally. And right now, we can’t afford to be picky.”

Jermaine sighed through his nose, weighing the argument. His fingers tapped once against his arm, a small tell of restless thought. “Allies or not, you all have to be sure. If places are vanishing, if things are changing on this scale… then trust isn’t just optional. It’s survival.”

The monks fell quiet again. This time, though, the silence wasn’t paralyzing—it was contemplative, the air thick with the recognition that Jermaine’s words weren’t just caution; they were truth.

Jermaine leaned forward, fingers laced, brows drawn as if weighing each word before speaking. His voice didn’t waver, but there was a thread of uncertainty he couldn’t mask. “What about Chase Young?” he asked finally, glancing from one monk to the next. “I mean… if he’s as strong as you’ve all said—and if anyone could sense these shifts—wouldn’t he already know? Has he shown up here? At the temple?”

The question tightened the air. The monks exchanged looks, almost reluctant to answer, until Kimiko exhaled first. “No,” she said, her tone low. “Not once. And believe me, we wondered the same thing. If someone with his kind of reach hasn’t stepped forward… it either means he doesn’t care, or he’s holding back for reasons of his own.”

Raimundo scratched the back of his neck, adding with a frown, “Chase isn’t your everyday villain. He’s… complicated. Dangerous, yeah, but there’s a kind of code with him. Not like Wuya, who would just throw the world into fire if she thought she’d win. Old habits die hard, maybe. Part of him used to be Xiaolin, after all.”

Omi nodded slowly, voice soft but deliberate. “Chase Young is both enemy and… example. He shows us what happens if one allows ambition to consume the heart. Yet…” Omi hesitated, unusually cautious with his words. “…he does not destroy without reason. That makes him dangerous in another way.”

Jermaine’s lips pressed into a thin line. He didn’t interrupt—just let the words sink in. When he finally spoke, his tone was steady but probing. “So if he hasn’t moved, if he’s stayed quiet while this… shift is swallowing places whole, you’re saying it’s safer to keep him in the dark? That’s your play?”

Clay sighed, leaning back with a creak of his chair. “Ain’t exactly safe, partner, but it’s the best we got. Tellin’ the Heylin side ‘bout this? That’s handin’ dynamite to someone who already knows how to blow up the barn. No good can come from it.”

Kimiko crossed her arms, a spark of defiance in her voice. “Exactly. The second villains know how unstable things are, they’ll use it. Twist it. Whatever this shift is, it’s already dangerous enough without Wuya or Hannibal Bean trying to weaponize it.”

Jermaine’s jaw flexed, as if he wanted to argue, but Raimundo cut in with a shrug that carried just enough weight to settle the debate. “Look, man, it’s not about liking it. It’s about surviving it. We keep it to ourselves until we’ve got something solid. So it doesn't reach Chase Young, Wuya, Bean—none of them get a heads-up.”

The room fell quiet, heavy with the echo of unspoken fears. Then Dojo, who had been pacing in restless circles near the scrolls, scratched at his side with both claws. His snout wrinkled as he groaned. “Ughhh—okay, I hate to say it, but this energy shift thing? It’s driving me crazy. It’s like a permanent itch I can’t scratch. If I hang around this temple too long, I’m gonna lose it.”

He flapped once, coiling and uncoiling as though trying to shake the discomfort out of his scales. “I’m glad you’re here, Jermaine. Really. Seeing you step up makes me feel like we’re not totally falling apart. But I need to move. I need to fly. If this itch gets worse, I won’t be good to anyone just pacing around here.”

Jermaine gave him a short, grateful nod. “Do what you have to do. Just don’t disappear on us.”

Dojo’s grin flashed briefly, though his tail flicked with unease. “Don’t worry, kid—I’ll be back. I always come back. But for now, the energy’s too raw. Makes me feel like I’m walking on glass.” With a beat of wings, he rose toward the high temple windows, muttering, “All right, all right, Dojo the scouting dragon to the rescue…” before slipping into the sky.

The silence he left behind wasn’t empty—it pressed heavier than before. For the first time, Jermaine realized what he’d stepped into wasn’t just another fight. It was something that might swallow even those who had dedicated their lives to balance.

“Then it’s us,” he said, steady, voice cutting through. “No Chase. No villains. No one else. Just us—for now. So we better be damn sure we don’t waste time.”

And the monks, uneasy but united, nodded…

—

Jack’s shoes made squelching sounds against the wet pavement, each hurried step splashing small arcs of water behind him. The rain came down in slanted sheets, cold and impatient, sliding beneath the collar of his coat and drumming against the cheap umbrella that had already started to bend awkwardly under the wind. He didn’t know where he was going—he only knew he had to keep moving. The streets blurred, neon signs bending in the haze, the cafeteria’s fogged-up windows offering a momentary glow of warmth he did not enter. His pace was frantic, head down, shoulders hunched, as though speed alone could keep him from thinking too much.

The footsteps came fast, catching rhythm with his own. For a moment he thought it was just the echo of the rain, bouncing off concrete and glass, but then the pattern was wrong—too deliberate. Jack’s heart kicked up, and he quickened, nearly breaking into a run. Then a hand caught his shoulder. Cold leather pressed into him, firm and unyielding, and before he even thought he turned sharply, panic guiding his hand.

The slap cracked louder than the rain.

The stranger’s head jerked back with the force of it, and Jack froze, eyes wide, the echo of his own palm still stinging against his skin. “Oh my—oh my gosh, I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean—I thought—!” His words spilled over each other, tripping into the storm as he fumbled to hold onto the umbrella, nearly losing it to a gust of wind. He reached out in apology, babbling breathless excuses, when his gaze caught on the gloves.

White. Too white to be ordinary.

His eyes traveled down—the shirt, striped red and white, soaking through in the downpour, yet still unmistakable. The stripes. The gloves. The umbrella that wasn’t just any umbrella—it was his .

Jack’s breath hitched. He blinked, wiping rain from his lashes, staring like he’d seen a ghost. “…Le Mime?”

The figure tilted his head slightly, water dripping from the brim of his black beret, his painted face unreadable even in surprise. It was Le Mime, unmistakably so—expression soft, confused, but not angry. Not even after the slap. He simply blinked at Jack, silent as ever, then glanced at the umbrella Jack still gripped in nervous hands.

Jack’s face went red under the streaks of rain. He scrambled, shoving the umbrella forward as though it were suddenly burning his skin. “Here—this—it’s yours—I didn’t—uh—I mean, thanks, you—wow, sorry again, I didn’t mean to—uh—hit you—” He laughed awkwardly, a high-pitched, nervous sputter, shoving the umbrella insistently toward Le Mime.

Le Mime accepted it without hesitation, closing his gloved fingers around the handle. The movement was slow, almost delicate, as though he were taking back not just an umbrella but a weight Jack hadn’t realized he’d been carrying. For a second, the mime simply looked at him, rain streaming between them in silver curtains, his silence more expressive than any words Jack could have thrown into the storm.

Jack shifted on his feet, about to mumble one last apology and flee the awkwardness, when he felt a tug. Le Mime’s hand caught his wrist—not hard, but firm enough to stop him mid-step. Jack blinked down at the grip, startled, and looked up.

Le Mime raised the umbrella, tilting his head toward the sky. Rain pattered heavy and merciless, running cold rivulets down Jack’s face and soaking through every layer of clothing. The mime’s painted brows lifted, as if to say look .

Jack tilted his head back despite himself. The city above was smeared in water, streetlamps flickering halos against the storm. The clouds were bruised and endless, but in the flicker of lightning he caught the stark outline of the world stretched and drenched in silver light. He hadn’t realized how heavy the rain really was until now, hadn’t noticed how loud, how overwhelming—how small he looked standing in it.

Le Mime stepped closer, the umbrella opening in a flourish with a practiced flick of the wrist, shielding them both under its canopy. His silence was a statement all on its own: You’ll drown if you keep walking like that.

Jack’s throat tightened. His instinct was to blurt something—anything—but for once the words jammed up, stuck against the lump of guilt and embarrassment. All he managed was a quiet, “...Thanks.”

Le Mime only gave a little nod, the faintest curve at the corner of his painted lips—was that a smile?—before steering them forward, the umbrella steady over them both, a silent truce against the storm.

Jack didn’t know what had compelled him to open his mouth, but the words had slipped out before he could drag them back down:

“Do you… uh, do you have a place to go?”

He wasn’t sure what he expected—maybe a brisk nod, maybe a shrug, maybe Le Mime just vanishing into the rain the same way he always seemed to appear from it. Instead, the man froze mid-step, his head tilting slightly, like the question itself was foreign currency he had to study before accepting. The painted smile on his face didn’t change, but something in his eyes flickered—something softer, slower. His free hand rose, poised as if he were about to trace the outline of a roof in the air, confident, proud even. For a second, Jack thought he would. But then the motion faltered, and instead of a roof, Le Mime mimed a circle—empty, hollow—before patting his own chest once and letting his hand fall to his side.

It wasn’t just silence now; it was the weight of something unspoken. A sad smile, painted lips curving the same way they always did, but the corners of his eyes betrayed it. Jack caught it. He wasn’t good at much—he knew that—but he was good at noticing cracks in masks, because he wore so many of his own.

“Oh,” Jack said, voice small. The umbrella wobbled between them before Le Mime steadied it with a practiced hand. “So… not really anywhere close, huh?”

Le Mime shrugged once, fluid and light, as though brushing the whole matter off. His shoulders lifted with an almost theatrical elegance, then dropped just as smoothly, like it didn’t matter. But Jack’s chest tightened, because if it didn’t matter, then why the sad eyes? Why the pause? Why the way his mime’s silence filled the rain with more than just quiet?

Jack’s mouth went dry. He wasn’t good at this. He wasn’t good at… people. But his tongue still worked faster than his brain, and he heard himself say, with the same tone he might use to offer someone a spare battery or a broken trinket:

“You could… uh. You could come to my place. Just for tonight. I mean—it’s nothing special, just, like, an apartment I keep when I don’t wanna crash in the school dorms. It’s not big, but it’s—uh—dry. Which is kind of the point right now, right? Staying dry?”

He laughed, thin and awkward, shoving his hands into his pockets before remembering the umbrella and almost whacking them both with it. Le Mime’s gaze flicked to him, unreadable but intent. The umbrella tilted back into balance with the mime’s patient correction, and then, slowly, Le Mime pressed his hand to his chest—right over his heart—before extending it outward in a deliberate, slow gesture. Not a bow, not quite. More like… gratitude, shaped into air.

Jack’s ears burned. He couldn’t tell if it was from embarrassment or the rain dripping down his collar. “Right. Yeah. Okay. I mean—it’s not like I’m offering charity or anything, it’s just practical, you know? Practical! Two people, one umbrella, and a dry roof. Makes sense.”

Le Mime didn’t nod, didn’t bow this time. He just walked, steady, umbrella in hand, keeping it carefully centered above them both. Jack had no idea if he was agreeing, if he was mocking, or if he was just being himself. But the silence between them felt… less like a void and more like a held breath.

Jack shoved his hands deeper into his coat and quickened his pace to match the mime’s. “Guess that’s settled then.”

The rain beat against the umbrella. The city streets blurred around them. For once, Jack wasn’t sure if he was running from something or toward it.

The walk was quieter than Jack expected it to be, though maybe that was because silence was all Le Mime ever carried with him. Jack kept sneaking glances, trying not to be obvious, though it was hard not to notice the odd way Le Mime seemed almost… proud. His chin tilted slightly higher than before, the painted lips curved in a way that was too subtle for most to catch but clear enough when you were the one standing beside him. Jack couldn’t have known that this little satisfaction came from Le Mime’s deliberate performance—how he had shaped his face earlier, drawn on that sad smile with his silence, all so Jack would open his mouth and invite him in. Jack only thought the man was strange, maybe unpredictable, but harmless.

The rain softened as they made their way down the street, not stopping, but no longer as punishing as before. Each droplet landed with a lighter patter on the umbrella, like a softer percussion now leading their pace. Jack noticed, in between the shuffle of shoes on wet pavement, that Le Mime was angling the umbrella more toward him. Jack was almost entirely shielded, while Le Mime’s own left shoulder was already damp, rain darkening the fabric. It was almost absurd, this silent man dressed in stripes and gloves, smiling faintly while his shoulder soaked, making no effort to readjust. Jack’s brow creased, guilt tugging at him, but when he opened his mouth to say something, Le Mime’s glance cut toward him with that painted calm and that small smile, as if to say don’t bother . Jack closed his mouth again.

They passed a row of shops that broke the monotony of rain-slicked concrete. A bakery with its golden light spilling out through fogged windows, the warm smell of bread almost reaching them before the rain stole it away. A bookstore tucked between two clothing stores, its sign crooked but inviting. And then the toy store—colorful, almost glowing compared to the gray street. Jack might’ve missed it entirely if it weren’t for the sudden shift beside him. Le Mime’s steps slowed. His head turned.

Through the display window, bright with plastic and motionless fun, a robot toy stood in the center, arms outstretched, painted metal shining under the fluorescent light. Le Mime’s painted eyes widened just slightly, the kind of expression that children wear when they forget to hide their wonder. He leaned ever so slightly toward the window, still holding the umbrella steady above them both, and then looked at Jack—hopeful, as if sharing something wordless, like saying look at that, isn’t it wonderful?

Jack did glance, but it was brief. Too brief. His eyes barely touched the toy before darting away again, as if looking too long might break something inside of him. He swallowed, tightening his jaw, walking a little faster. He didn’t want to see it—not the robot, not the store, not the small flicker of innocent joy in someone else’s face. His chest felt heavy.

Le Mime noticed. He didn’t stop smiling, but it shifted, softened, turned into something gentler. He didn’t push. He just adjusted his hold on the umbrella, letting Jack keep his pace. The toy store’s glow dimmed behind them as the street grew narrower, quieter again.

And then, at last, the outline of the apartment building rose ahead. Jack exhaled, more from relief than exhaustion. “Almost there,” he muttered, mostly to himself. The rain still fell, but not as sharp now, as if even the storm was beginning to give them space.

Le Mime only nodded, his smile small but steady, his damp shoulder glistening in the light. He looked up at the residence ahead as though he’d known all along that this was where the night would lead them.

The door to the residence was heavy, darker than it needed to be, its brass handle catching a weak reflection of the streetlights. Jack felt the tension coil tighter in his stomach the moment they reached it. He stepped forward automatically, his hand brushing the handle first—politeness, yes, but more than anything the nervous reflex of someone who needed to be busy, needed to do something with his hands, otherwise the silence might devour him whole. He pushed the door open, glancing back for just a fraction of a second. Le Mime was still there, dripping, soaked at the shoulders where the umbrella had failed him. The stripes of his shirt clung faintly to his frame, water tracing rivers down the painted white of his jaw. His grin, though faint and wordless, had not wavered.

Jack was really concious—without wanting to—that the umbrella hadn’t been shared equally at all. Le Mime had tilted it just so, so that Jack’s head and shoulders remained dry, while the mime himself absorbed more of the storm without complaint, as if that were the natural order of things. And what startled Jack was not the imbalance, but how happy Le Mime looked about it, how he seemed genuinely pleased with himself, like someone basking in the success of a small but deliberate plan. Jack’s chest tightened with that kind of nervousness that wasn’t about mortal danger or battles or showdowns, but about people —being seen, being noticed, being cared for. His ears burned, and he tried to mask it with quick, fumbling words that even he didn’t quite process.

The umbrella came down as they entered, Le Mime’s gloved hands snapping it closed with a deft, almost theatrical motion. Water flicked in neat arcs, droplets scattering like stars across the dim lobby floor. Jack flinched, mumbling something close to “sorry” though he wasn’t even the one responsible. The mime only smiled again, a faint nod, that same silence pressing between them, soft but heavy— expressive silence , the kind that made Jack feel both cornered and oddly… safe.

The rain, though muffled by the thick walls, seemed to pulse louder whenever Jack’s anxiety rose, its rhythm against the windows like a mirror to the churn in his chest. He hated that coincidence—it made him feel as though the sky were mocking him, calling out each quickened beat of his thoughts. He couldn’t look at Le Mime for more than a second at a time, because each glance seemed to catch some new expression he wasn’t ready to parse. There was mischief in the mime’s eyes, unmistakable, as if he had orchestrated the entire evening, as if getting wet had been part of the plan, just so Jack would say come with me .

And Le Mime was clearly happy . His shoulders were soaked, his gloves damp and clinging faintly to his fingers, his striped shirt plastered with rain, and yet he radiated a boyish triumph. Each step he took into the residence was light, silent, but filled with a kind of energy—like someone walking into a stage he already knew the lines for, even if his partner had no idea what play they were acting in. He glanced sidelong at Jack, a look not meant to pierce but to linger , and Jack felt himself recoil inward, his politeness rising up like armor. He gestured awkwardly, muttering about wiping their feet, about the stairs, about nothing of consequence.

But all the while, Le Mime’s smile—small, patient, almost affectionate in its restraint—seemed to make the lobby warmer than it was. Jack thought, fleetingly, that he would never understand how silence could press so much on him, how painted lips and a tilted umbrella could unravel his composure faster than words ever could.

Still Jack led the way to his apartment, using the elevator was kind of uncomfortable but at least the fact that le mime was… mime, meant that conversation wouldn't start from his part at least not in a conventional way, once they where out jack was fast to spot his door which had a system in which you have to put a code.

Jack punched in the code with a nervous flick of his fingers, making sure to shield the keypad with his narrow frame, as if Le Mime might be the kind of guest to memorize numbers and later sneak in. The door beeped, unlocked, and Jack—trying very hard to be polite in the way only someone deeply unsure of themselves can manage—pushed it open and gestured with a jerky motion for Le Mime to step inside first.

The apartment swallowed them in a soft hush, the rain muffled now, distant against the tall glass windows. It was "nice"—the sort of apartment you could pluck out of a catalog and drop into the life of anyone vaguely upper-class. Polished floors, furniture in safe, neutral tones, clean lines, a coffee table that gleamed without the slightest fingerprint. It was impressive in the way a hotel suite might be, but as Le Mime’s dark eyes wandered over it, there was a clear lack of anything that screamed Jack Spicer. No photos, no clutter, no gadgets lying half-disassembled. A person could live here for years and leave no mark at all.

Jack noticed it too. Or rather, he noticed it now, standing awkwardly in the silence beside someone whose painted smile somehow saw through him. His shoulders hunched slightly, as if he were shrinking under the weight of his own sterile space. He hadn’t exactly been loud since Le Mime found him in the storm, but here, in this apartment, with the lamps humming faintly and everything too still, it was impossible not to feel how the years pressed in.

Le Mime, however, didn’t look disappointed. His lips curved upward—not the exaggerated mime smile, but a quieter, warmer thing. He tilted his head, dripping wet onto the pristine floor, and Jack scrambled with sudden urgency.

“Towels. Right. You’re—uh—soaked. Sit, it’s fine, don’t worry about the couch, it’s not—whatever, I’ll just—” He vanished briefly down the hall, returning with two thick towels, nearly tripping over himself to hand them off. When Le Mime made no protest and allowed him to fuss, Jack ended up not only dropping the towels into his lap but actually patting one against his dripping hair.

The act felt strange in his own body, like his hands were moving ahead of his brain. He wasn’t indecent, wasn’t trying to be anything, and yet—this small kindness, this impulse to help—it felt alien coming from him. Out of character. Like he’d stepped outside himself. And yet when Le Mime looked up at him, hair flattened, painted face softened, and smiled with unabashed ease, Jack couldn’t help it: he smiled back.

That was when he noticed. The storm had washed away more than rain. The thick red circles on Le Mime’s cheeks were gone, streaked away into faint traces, leaving his face paler, plainer—more human. The white paint clung stubbornly, but it made the absence of the red even funnier somehow. He looked like a drenched dog with carefully combed fur ruined.

Jack bit down hard on the inside of his cheek, tried to hold it in. He really tried. But then it escaped him: a short, sharp laugh that cut the silence.

He froze, eyes wide. That sound —that was him. Laughing.

“Oh, no,” he muttered, clapping a hand over his mouth. His shoulders jerked as another laugh broke through, muffled but unstoppable, spilling out against his palm. It wasn’t polite, it wasn’t cool, it wasn’t even careful—but it was there.

And Le Mime? He simply sat with that same gentle smile, dripping water into the expensive sofa, tilting his head in a way that said: yes, laugh. I don’t mind at all.

Jack’s laughter had burned itself down to little sparks, like embers that refused to die out, and every time he glanced at Le Mime—soaked, white makeup faintly streaking, cheeks stripped of their painted blush—he felt another little tremor of mirth escape him. The man really did look like a wet dog, a dignified, theatrical wet dog, and Jack couldn’t quite stop himself from chuckling again, this time lower, softer, almost conspiratorial.

Le Mime, still dripping water onto the expensive sofa that Jack didn’t even like sitting on, tilted his head with that same indulgent smile, a wordless go on, laugh if you must . But there was, behind the charm, something flickering—an almost imperceptible crease of confusion when Jack finally placed the mirror into his hands. The mime’s brows lifted, his eyes widened, as if he were startled by his own reflection, as though he hadn’t expected to see the streaks, the little evidence of time and rain undoing his craft.

Then, of course, he made a performance of it. Hands flying up in pantomimed despair, mouth open in a silent cry, mimed sobs rattling his shoulders as though the ruin of his makeup were a tragedy worthy of the stage. He died three times in Jack’s living room, clutching his chest, swooning dramatically into invisible arms, sliding off the edge of the couch in mock defeat. Jack pressed the back of his hand to his mouth, as if that might contain the sound, but it didn’t—the laughter spilled out anyway, helpless, raw, betraying him in a way words never did.

The mime glanced back at him between his exaggerated motions, and there was no reproach, only a secret gladness at having made Jack laugh so fully.

It was only when Jack noticed the trail of water still dripping from Le Mime’s hair down his neck, soaking into fabric and cushions alike, that he forced himself to move. Muttering something sharp and awkward about “the mess” and “the towels,” he disappeared for a moment, returning armed with a hair dryer and a stack of clothing that looked like it hadn’t been touched in years. The dryer whirred to life, its noise filling the silence Jack didn’t know how to fill otherwise, and he carefully combed warm air through the tangled dark of Le Mime’s hair. The mime sat still, closing his eyes like someone enjoying a small luxury, and Jack tried not to think too hard about how careful his own hands were being.

Then the clothes: a red sweater and black pants, too large on him, relics of parents who hadn’t bothered to notice that their son had stayed small. He shoved them into Le Mime’s arms with a brusque, embarrassed little explanation, but when Le Mime held them up against himself, it was obvious the size wasn’t an issue—he was taller, broader, the kind of figure that made even ill-fitted clothes look deliberate.

For the briefest moment, Jack caught himself staring, realizing with something like a twist in his chest that Le Mime looked right at home here, dripping water and all.

Still, it only took a few minutes for Jack’s brain to catch up with the scene—the hair dryer buzzing, water dripping onto the floor, the sweater clutched in Le Mime’s hands—and suddenly he realized the obvious. The guy was still drenched. His clothes clung heavy to his skin, and no amount of warm air from a dryer was going to fix that. Jack slapped his forehead lightly and scrambled up from the edge of the bed.

“Right—okay, wait, you’ll, uh—you’ll get sick like that,” he said in a rush, half to himself, half to Le Mime. He tugged him gently up by the wrist and steered him down the hallway, rattling off instructions before his guest even had time to react. “Bathroom’s here. Towels on the rack, hot water works but you have to let it run a minute, uh—soap’s under the sink, shampoo too. Clothes—you can change into those after. And socks, too. Brand new, so don’t worry.”

He shoved the bundle of clothing inside, including a fresh pair of socks from a package he’d never bothered to open because he had more than enough of those stuffed in drawers. He kept talking fast, words tripping over themselves, his tone sharp not from anger but from the awkward need to fill silence.

Le Mime stood at the threshold, still dripping, listening like a student trying to memorize a lecture. Then, without warning, he straightened his shoulders, puffed his chest out, and gave a crisp thumbs up , his expression glowing with exaggerated pride, as if Jack had just entrusted him with a great and noble quest.

Jack blinked at him, caught between groaning and laughing. “Yeah, yeah, don’t look so proud—it’s just a shower,” he muttered, rubbing at the back of his neck. “I’ll, uh, wait outside.”

He pulled the door closed behind him, leaning against it for a second with a sigh, before dragging himself a few steps down the hall to sit on the floor. The muffled sound of the pipes kicking to life reached him, and for some reason, that alone made his chest feel a little lighter.

Jack sat with his back against the hallway wall, knees pulled up, fingers twitching against his jeans in small restless taps. He told himself he was just waiting, just giving Le Mime enough time to finish up, but his thoughts began sprawling like tangled wires in his head, refusing to stay neat.

It hit him suddenly—this was the first time anyone had ever been here. Not even his parents had crossed the threshold; the few times they’d needed to, he’d found excuses, delays, anything to keep them out. And “friends”—if they could even be called that—were another matter. They thought Jack was fine around them, cheerful, maybe a little too eager, but it was all staged, a performance he played so often it became muscle memory. None of them had ever been in this space.

This apartment was supposed to be his shield, the one place he didn’t have to act, the one place where no one else’s eyes followed him around. But now Le Mime was here, moving about behind the bathroom door, leaving faint echoes of running water through the pipes. It should have felt like an intrusion. Jack knew that. He braced for it, the itchy discomfort of someone invading his territory, yet it didn’t arrive. Instead, there was a strange calm to it, almost a warmth, like the walls themselves didn’t mind another presence. And that unsettled him more than anything else.

His thoughts unraveled further, slipping into places he usually tried not to linger. He pictured Le Mime stepping out hungry, weak from the rain and the shower. Hungry. The word stuck, looping around until it became louder, heavier. He realized he hadn’t even thought to offer food. What if he was starving? What could he give him? He stood and paced once, eyes darting toward the kitchen. Nothing there looked decent enough, nothing that wouldn’t feel like he was handing scraps. His chest tightened until a voice—his own, but not quite, that inner tone he nicknamed good Jack —cut through.

Hey, it’s fine. Just order something. Something easy, something safe.

Jack nodded to himself. Pizza. Pepperoni. That worked, didn’t it? He fumbled with his phone, ordering quickly, but the doubt came back immediately after hitting confirm. What if he doesn’t like pepperoni? What if he doesn’t even eat pizza? What if—

Relax, the inner voice said again, almost soothing, almost too practiced, like it had said the same thing countless times before. It’s fine. He’ll eat. He’ll smile. Just wait.

Jack tried to trust it. He sat back down in the hallway, listening to the water run, the silence stretching. Le Mime really did take his time, but eventually the pipes hissed off, and a few moments later the door opened.

Le Mime stepped out with damp hair half-dry, smelling faintly of soap and heat. The red sweater hung comfortably on him, the black pants fit fine, and the brand-new white socks made him look oddly grounded, as if he belonged there already. But what caught Jack’s attention most—what made him blink—was the paint on his face. His makeup was perfect again, not a smudge, not a line out of place.

“Wait—how did you even…?” Jack started, baffled, motioning at his own face in a rough circle.

Le Mime didn’t answer with words, of course. Instead, he lifted his hand, mimed the motion of zipping his mouth shut, locked it with a twist, and threw away an invisible key. Then he gave a small, triumphant smile as if that answered everything.

Jack stared, caught between confusion and a laugh, and rubbed the back of his neck in a nervous habit. “Uh, right. Okay. Well—um—I ordered pizza. Pepperoni. If you… want some?” His voice cracked slightly on the last word, betraying nerves he tried to swallow down.

Le Mime’s face lit up with something simple and bright, and before Jack could step back or say more, he was pulled into a quick, firm hug.

Jack froze, heat rushing up the back of his neck. “Guess that’s a yes,” he muttered under his breath, heart pounding harder than he thought it should over something so small. Maybe Le Mime was hungry. Maybe that hug really was just for the pizza. But part of him—the part that always overthought—wondered if it meant more.

After some time the delivery guy came. Jack took the pizza box from the delivery guy, muttered a quick thanks, and closed the door with his hip. The warmth of the apartment was a contrast to the chill outside, though the smell of hot pepperoni already started to seep through the cardboard.

When he turned back, he froze for half a second.

Le Mime had settled himself not at the little table near the TV—where Jack assumed a normal guest might go—but right up on the kitchen counter, perched comfortably with his legs dangling, red sweater bright against the pale surface. Like he belonged there. Like this wasn’t someone else’s apartment, but his. Jack blinked, shook it off, and carried the pizza over.

He set it down, pulled two plates from the cabinet, and slid one toward Le Mime. The mime didn’t hesitate; he dove right in, peeling off slices and chewing happily, almost with a kind of gusto that made Jack wonder when he last ate. Jack himself picked at a slice, chewing half-heartedly, watching as Le Mime plowed through three slices without slowing. Not sloppy, not disgusting, but definitely hungry.

By the fourth slice, Jack’s curiosity finally cracked open. He fiddled with the crust of his own slice, leaned his chin into his hand, and asked, voice cautious but curious:

“So… how are you doing these days?”

The mime paused, holding his pizza in midair, then lowered it back onto his plate with a flourish. He puffed his chest a little, struck a pose as though he were standing on stage before a crowd, and then gave Jack a crisp thumbs up . His smile said, Great. His eyes said, Better than great.

Jack squinted. “Yeah, okay, that’s nice, but… not super clear.”

He hesitated, then got up and rummaged through his school bag until he found an old spiral notebook and a pencil. He shoved them onto the counter in front of Le Mime. “Here. You can… you know, write stuff. You do know how to write English, right? Or… maybe French? I don’t know, you understand me, so…”

Le Mime snatched the pencil eagerly, already scribbling with bold, oversized letters. He turned the notebook around with a flourish.

I BEEN DOING GREAT ROBBERIES THAT APPEAR ON NEWS >:D

Jack read it, blinked, and then tilted his head. “...Huh. Yeah. That… tracks.” Somehow, it didn’t even surprise him. It should have. But this was Le Mime.

“So how often do you do it? I mean, those robberies.”

The mime put down the pencil, raised his hand, and wobbled it side to side in a gesture that meant not much, just a little. Then he picked up the pencil again, tongue poking out in concentration as he scribbled more.

I DO IT WHEN I’M BORED
WORLD NEEDS TO BE CRAZY

Jack huffed out something between a laugh and a sigh. “Right. Chaos as a hobby. Makes sense for you.”

Le Mime grinned wider, clearly proud of himself. But then, without Jack even prompting, he leaned forward, scribbled again, and this time his words were a little smaller, the letters tighter.

BUT ROBBERIES NOT GETTING ATTENTION NOW.
TOO MANY STRANGE THINGS HAPPEN.

Jack’s stomach tightened. His slice of pizza suddenly didn’t look so appetizing anymore. “Strange things? Like… weird magic stuff?”

Le Mime just tilted his head, watching him. Then he flipped the pencil again, drew a big crooked question mark, and wrote underneath it in big blocky letters:

WHAT ABOUT YOU :)

Jack froze. The pencil mark stared back at him like it was louder than the words themselves. He felt the heat creep up his neck. “M–me?” He coughed, rubbed the back of his neck. “Uh… well, I don’t… I don’t really do the whole fighting thing anymore. With the Xiaolin monks, I mean. That sort of… stopped. Weird magic stuff got in the way. And, uh—” he laughed nervously, eyes darting toward the window as though someone else might hear, “—I just kinda… left it behind, I guess. Figured studying was safer. Got myself here, in France.”

He risked a glance at Le Mime, who had set the pencil down and was watching him intently, his hands folded under his chin like a child listening to a story.

Jack continued, voice a little lower. “You… you probably know. You perform outside the gates sometimes, right? People mention it. I’ve… seen you out there.”

Le Mime’s grin widened, slow and proud, like Jack had just solved a riddle. He tapped his own chest once, nodded, and mimed a little bow from his seat on the counter—acknowledging his audience.

Jack laughed, quiet and awkward, then reached for another slice even though his appetite hadn’t returned.

“Of course you do.”

Jack had just thanked him again, his voice softer this time, almost shy. “Really… thanks for the umbrella, that day. I was a mess. You… kinda saved me from looking even worse.” He rubbed the back of his neck, realizing how awkward that sounded. Across from him, Le Mime leaned back on the counter stool, one hand flicking in a dramatic brush-away motion, as though dismissing the gratitude—but the truth was painted all over his face. A grin. Wide, stupid, almost boyish. If sound were possible for him, Jack swore he would be hearing little suppressed giggles right now. It was infectious in its own way.

Jack let the silence hang for a second before biting his lip. “Uh—this might be rude, I don’t mean it that way but… why don’t you use your powers?” He tilted his head, genuinely curious. “I mean, you’re… you. That’s kinda your thing.”

The change was subtle but sharp: Le Mime’s grin faltered, his brows knit as though the question dragged something heavier from behind his playfulness. He didn’t glare at Jack, not at all—it wasn’t that—but the smile slipped into thought. His hands hovered in the air, hesitating, then dropped to the counter. Finally, he pulled the notebook closer, scrawling two simple words in blocky handwriting:

“Doesn’t work.”

Jack blinked. “Wait—what do you mean doesn’t work? Like… at all?” His voice jumped an octave before he steadied it. “That… doesn’t make sense.”

Le Mime didn’t answer right away. He shoved the last slice of pizza into his mouth with exaggerated speed, chewing as though preparing for a grand reveal. Jack’s heart sped a little when Le Mime suddenly hopped off the counter, grabbed his wrist, and tugged him toward the bathroom with that unshakable energy.

“Wha—hey! Okay, okay, I’m coming!” Jack stumbled, almost tripping over his own feet. His brain raced. What is he doing? Is this a setup? Oh, come on, Jack, calm down. He’s just… being him. Right. Totally fine. Absolutely not going to murder you in your own apartment.

Inside the bathroom, Le Mime immediately rolled up his sleeves, theatrically surveying the tiled stage like an actor about to perform. Jack stood in the doorway, arms crossed tightly. “So… we’re in the bathroom. This is normal. Yep. Totally fine. Normal roommate stuff.”

Le Mime snapped open an invisible umbrella, his motions crisp and charming, then turned the shower handle. Water cascaded down. He slid his invisible umbrella beneath it, stretching out his hands dramatically as though to channel something unseen. For a moment, Jack held his breath, almost believing—waiting for that uncanny shimmer that usually followed Le Mime’s illusions.

Nothing.

Le Mime tried again, face scrunching with determination. He repeated the gag—umbrella open, palm raised—this time squeezing his eyes shut with the effort. For one flicker of a second, Jack thought he saw the faint shimmer of energy, the illusion almost catching. Almost.

Then it sputtered out, collapsing into nothing more than water splattering against porcelain.

Le Mime let the umbrella vanish from his hands. His shoulders sagged, head tilting forward. His expression—no words, no sound—was clear enough: defeat.

Jack’s mouth parted slightly, unsure if he should speak. The silence pressed heavy in the small room. “You… can’t,” he whispered finally, more to himself than to Le Mime. “You really can’t.”

Le Mime turned to him, eyes soft but edged with frustration, giving the smallest shrug before spreading his hands as if to say, see?

Jack’s brain spun, words tangling in his mouth. “But… but you’re you. You can’t just… not. That’s like—like if I suddenly stopped building machines. Or, or if Wuya lost her voice. Or if Chase…” He trailed off, not sure where to put the comparison.

Le Mime only offered a faint smile—weak, but still touched with that same stubborn charm—as though daring Jack to laugh, to shrug it off like he did.

Instead, Jack rubbed his temple, his nerves buzzing with the weight of it all. Why me? Why here? Why now?

And yet, despite the confusion, despite the nervous knot twisting in his chest, he realized he was glad—glad that Le Mime had shown him this, that he trusted him enough to reveal the flaw behind the painted mask.

Jack exhaled slowly, almost steadying himself. “Okay… I get it,” he said softly. “Guess it’s just us then, huh? You and me.”

Le Mime’s lips twitched, the faintest return of that grin, and he gave a little flourish with his hand, bowing as if to confirm it.

Jack felt his ears burn. “Great. Just great,” he muttered under his breath. “Me and the world’s most dramatic mime. What could possibly go wrong?”

But in truth, the bathroom felt less heavy than before—like the secret itself had shifted something between them.

Still they got out of the bathroom. Jack let out a long breath, his back sinking into the cushions of the couch as though he wanted to be swallowed whole by it. The air felt heavy, and though the room was quiet—save for the ticking of a small wall clock—his head was anything but. Thoughts swirled, each louder than the last: the odd chill he’d been sensing around Paris, the monks’ strange plea for help echoing somewhere deep inside him, the sudden flicker and collapse of Le Mime’s powers. He rubbed at his temples, whispering in his own head, I don’t want to get dragged into this again. Not the magic, not the monks, not… anything.

But the voice inside him, the part of him that still cared despite everything, bit back. You can’t ignore this. If someone’s losing their powers, if things are breaking apart, you can’t just pretend it’s fine. Not this time.

Jack squeezed his eyes shut, trying to drown it out. He didn’t want to look at Le Mime and see another reminder of the world he’d tried so hard to step away from. But when he finally opened them, there was Le Mime, perched casually on the opposite end of the couch, watching him with a curious tilt of his head. The mime wasn’t writing, wasn’t performing—just staring, like he was waiting for Jack to decide something.

And then Jack cracked. He forced a smile, the kind that stretched too tight but at least looked convincing.
“Well,” Jack said, his voice breaking the stillness, “if your powers… I mean, if they’re not working… maybe I could… help you figure it out.”

Le Mime’s eyes lit up instantly. His whole body shifted forward, shoulders pulling up like a spring suddenly released. He mimed a little flourish, pressing both hands to his chest and then sweeping them outward with something that looked almost like gratitude, almost like relief.

Inside, Jack’s heart was pounding. What the hell am I doing? he thought, stomach knotting. I just signed myself up for—what? Another magical disaster? Exactly what I’ve avoided for four years? Great job, Jack, really great job.

But the “good Jack” voice in his head only hummed with satisfaction. See? You’re doing the right thing. He needs you.

Le Mime quickly scribbled something onto the notebook between them:

“You help?”

Jack nodded, though his face went pink with nerves. “Yeah. While I’m not at school, anyway. We can… I don’t know, test some stuff, maybe look into why this is happening.”

The mime’s grin was huge. He smacked the page with a little triumphant motion, as though stamping it, then lifted his hands skyward in a silent cheer. Jack managed a weak laugh, though the back of his neck burned.

Oh God, what did I just commit to?

And so, over the next days, the routine began to take shape. Classes in the morning, excuses to skip hanging out with classmates in the afternoon, and long evenings with Le Mime. Jack would show up at the apartment with his schoolbag half-full of notebooks and useless gadgets he’d tinkered with, while Le Mime prepared a space with props, umbrellas, gloves, and sometimes just a cleared-out floor.

Each session was the same: experiment, fail, try again, and Jack writing frantic notes while Le Mime expressed every flicker of frustration, hope, or joy with his whole body. And though Jack hated to admit it—even to himself—something in those hours started to feel almost natural.

Even if deep down, he knew he was walking straight back into the storm he’d once run from.

Chapter Text

Jack woke up without remembering how he had gotten there, as though sleep itself had carried him and dropped him into his bed like a discarded bundle. His eyes flicked to the clock and it was a shot through the chest: he bolted up, body racing ahead of thought, bare feet colliding with the cold floor, routine already moving as if survival depended on it. Toothbrush in his mouth, foam burning his tongue, water crashing over his skin in a frantic shower, fingers fumbling buttons into place. Mechanical. Urgent. Blind. Until—like a sudden hollow opening inside a familiar road—he noticed it. The absence. The silence of the house. The echo that felt less like calm and more like vacancy. Le Mime wasn’t there.

The realization hit him with a violence greater than any nightmare. What if it never happened? What if he had only dreamed it? Breath caught in his throat, his hands gripped the edge of the sink as though it could anchor him. “It could have been a dream—yes, just a dream.” No. It wasn’t. “But if it was—then I’m crazy, I’m losing it.” He was here. “What if he left—because of me—because—” His mind fractured, words spinning too fast to form a chain of reason, panic folding in on itself until it was only noise.

And then—something sharp, like a hand on the shoulder snapping him back. The sight of it: the wet patch on the couch, dark against the fabric, proof of a body that had rested there. The pizza box open on the counter, greasy air lingering like a memory that wouldn’t wash out. So it wasn’t a dream. It wasn’t. But panic was still chewing his thoughts, racing, always racing, until—

— Breathe.

The voice wasn’t his, not entirely. It slid in calm, almost parental, steadying. He’s fine. Stop tearing yourself apart. You need to help him, not panic.

Jack blinked. His body unclenched as though the panic had burned itself out, leaving only quiet. His jaw loosened, shoulders lowering as if they’d surrendered to gravity. He moved carefully now, as though each motion were deliberate. To the table. The bag. A bottle. The calm hands opening the cap, shaking pills into his palm. A glass of water, cool down his throat.

— That’s better, the voice murmured, no louder than a thought. Keep moving. Keep steady. You won’t lose him. Not like this.

Jack’s eyes slid to the counter. He reached for the pizza box, took the last cold slice, stiff with congealed cheese, but necessary somehow—something that kept the moment tethered. Then he walked out the door.

Jack stepped out into the pale morning, the air cool and damp as though the world had been washed clean while he wasn’t looking. His legs carried him forward before his head had caught up, each step quick and uneven, more like stumbling than walking. His breath snagged against his ribs, shallow, unsteady, too fast, as if the act of moving itself demanded more oxygen than he had to give. The street stretched ahead in its plain familiarity—cracked sidewalks, the faint smell of wet asphalt, the sound of distant cars—but to him it might as well have been a foreign landscape. His mind was still spinning with the same choking refrain: what if he was gone, what if he was never real, what if, what if, what if. The panic threatened to climb again, the edge of it scraping against his throat, until—

— Left foot. Right foot. That’s all. Keep walking, Jack.

The voice cut through like a lantern in fog. Gentle, steady, never mocking, as though it knew the weight of his panic but refused to let him drown. You’re breathing too fast. Slow it. In—yes. Now out. Good. Again. Match it to your steps. In. Out. That’s it. Jack obeyed without thinking, because the voice wasn’t cruel and it wasn’t demanding—it simply guided, simple instructions tied to the rhythm of his own body. With each block he crossed, the chaos in his head quieted enough for him to notice his surroundings again: the tree roots cracking the pavement, the paper stuck damply to the curb, the sound of a dog barking somewhere behind a fence. The world wasn’t spinning away from him anymore. It held.

The further he went, the more his body seemed to loosen. His stride grew steadier, less frantic. The tightness in his chest began to ease, replaced with something that almost resembled rhythm, a manageable pattern he could hold onto. Better, the voice said softly, almost proud. See? You can do this. You’re not falling apart, not if you keep listening. You’re walking. You’re breathing. You’re here. You’re fine. The calm words folded around him like a blanket he hadn’t known he needed, and for a brief moment, Jack felt the possibility of safety. His hands stopped trembling. His eyes didn’t dart so frantically. The panic had been carved down into something small, something survivable.

The gates of the school loomed ahead, metal bars tall and plain, but they carried a weight in his mind far heavier than their simple design. His steps slowed as the familiar dread pooled back in his stomach, heavy and sour. Almost there, the voice said, still warm, still patient. You’ve done well, Jack. You kept moving. You’re steady now. You’re safe. You made it. There was an edge of celebration to it, a quiet triumph, as though surviving the walk itself was a victory worth acknowledging. And maybe it was. Maybe the act of arriving without collapsing was more than enough.

But Jack didn’t let himself linger on that comfort. The moment the praise brushed against him, he shoved it away, silencing the voice, pushing it back into whatever corner it came from. He didn’t want to celebrate. He didn’t want to hear it. He wanted only the sharp focus of moving forward, of getting through the gate, of folding himself into the noise and anonymity of the school day. No comfort. No voice. Just steps. Just the next thing. His hand tightened around the strap of his bag, his jaw set, and he crossed the threshold. It was going to be a long day.

The morning had begun without incident, or at least Jack told himself so. The hours folded into one another with the slow, airless weight that only schooldays could carry. His pen scratched obediently across the page, numbers and formulas that assembled themselves into something tidy, something predictable, something he barely had to think about. The teacher’s voice droned on, a cadence Jack had long ago learned to absorb without needing to attach meaning to every word. Around him, the class shifted in its usual muted rhythm—chairs scraping, someone sighing, the faint tap-tap-tap of a pencil two rows ahead. It was the sort of environment where nothing was supposed to happen, a place where the world narrowed to chalk, paper, and the dim insistence of fluorescent lights overhead. Jack, in his usual seat near the back, leaned lazily to one side, his chin almost sinking into his palm as his gaze wandered without urgency toward the window. Just sky, just trees, just—

Something moved.

At first he thought it was just a shadow, a trick of the sun filtering unevenly through the branches. But no—his eyes focused sharply now, and his throat nearly tightened shut. Something was climbing. Not something. Someone. His heart kicked hard against his ribs, but his face stayed blank, dulled by years of practice. It couldn’t be. It shouldn’t be. But it was. Le Mime. His pale form pressed against the glass with a childlike persistence, fingers splayed as though the window were no obstacle at all.

“Mr. Spicer,” the teacher’s voice snapped across the room with the suddenness of a whip. Jack jolted upright in his chair, a prickle of sweat on the back of his neck. “Is there something out there more fascinating than trigonometric?”

Jack’s lips parted, fumbling for a response that would not incriminate him, and in the sharpest, flattest tone he could summon, he muttered, “No. Nothing.”

The teacher narrowed her eyes, unimpressed. “Being clever doesn’t excuse you from paying attention. Genius or not, the rules apply to you as well.”

“Yes,” Jack answered quickly, nodding, forcing himself to look down at the open page of his notebook. His pencil tapped once, twice, against the paper, an anchor against the pounding in his ears. He must look normal. He had to.

But against his better judgment, his gaze slid sideways again, just a fraction—just enough to confirm. And there it was: Le Mime’s face, pressed so close against the glass that the condensation of his breath smeared across it. His lips tugged upward in a proud, mischievous smile, as though this absurd stunt were the pinnacle of brilliance. Jack’s stomach dropped.

He ducked behind his textbook, lifting it just high enough to shield his mouth. “Stop,” he hissed, barely shaping the word. His eyes darted back to the teacher, who was writing on the board now, oblivious. “You can’t—stop—”

But Le Mime was beaming, delighted with himself, as if every warning Jack whispered were an applause. His hands fumbled eagerly at the latch of the window, tugging with the exaggerated pantomime of a stage performer certain of his audience. Jack’s grip on the textbook tightened, knuckles blanching. He was grateful, suddenly, for the lonely anonymity of his seat at the far back. No one else could see. No one else could catch him arguing with a ghost outside the glass.

And Le Mime only grinned wider, triumphant.

Jack was really, REALLY trying to do something he made a gesture trying to whisper until his  hand froze mid-gesture, the words halfway out of his mouth when the slam came down against his desk. The sound jolted him more than he’d admit, rattling through his chest like an explosion no one else seemed to notice. He didn’t dare look up at first, but the shadow of the teacher loomed, and when he finally raised his eyes, he was met with a glare sharp enough to pin him to his seat.

“Mr. Spicer,” the teacher said slowly, measured, as though choosing every syllable with care. “Do you have any problems with my class today?”

Jack’s lips parted, but his tongue clung to the roof of his mouth. He risked a flicker of a glance to the side—toward the window where Le Mime had been dangling only moments before. Nothing. Gone. Except… not gone. The faintest shift of air brushed across his cheek, and he noticed the windowpane was just slightly ajar, a line of shadow splitting the glass where it shouldn’t. Le Mime was out there. Jack knew it. Hanging on. Probably one slip away from crashing down three floors.

“I—uh, no, sir. No problems at all,” Jack mumbled, his textbook inching higher as though it could cover his burning face.

The teacher’s frown deepened. “Good. Because the fact that you’re a genius doesn’t grant you immunity from basic attention. If you insist on being present in body only, the least you could do is refrain from distracting those who actually want to learn.”

Jack nodded quickly. “Yes. Got it. Sorry.”

The teacher didn’t sound convinced, but after a sharp sigh he reached across, slid the window shut with a loud click , and walked away, muttering under his breath about wasted potential. The moment his back was turned, Jack’s whole body leaned forward instinctively, his knuckles pressed white against the desk as he tried to peer past the glass. His chest was a knot.

And then—yes. There. Just barely visible past the sill, Le Mime’s pale fingers scrabbling desperately at the frame, his whole body dangling like a stubborn marionette refusing to drop the act. His face appeared for half a second, flushed with effort but still wearing that ridiculous, triumphant grin, as if he thought this was some kind of grand performance just for Jack’s eyes.

“Oh no… oh no no no,” Jack whispered into the crook of his elbow, pretending to cough to cover it. He sank lower in his seat, his textbook still acting as a flimsy shield while he hissed under his breath, “Stop it, stop it, you’re gonna fall, you idiot! What are you even doing here?! This is not—this is not the time—”

Le Mime only grinned wider, one eyebrow cocked in a pantomime of mockery, as if Jack’s panic were the punchline of a joke. His other hand clawed up another inch, another grip on the stone, his foot wedged awkwardly against the edge of the sill. Jack could practically hear the scrape of his shoe, even though it was silent.

“Sit down, Spicer,” the teacher barked again from across the room without even looking, and Jack nearly jumped out of his skin.

“Y-yeah. Sitting. Sitting’s good,” Jack muttered, forcing himself to face forward, though his eyes kept darting back whenever he thought no one would notice. The sight waiting for him made his stomach sink.

Le Mime was still struggling . Still smiling. Still climbing. And Jack knew, with a dread he couldn’t shake, that if he didn’t think of something fast, this clownish intruder was going to bring the whole day crashing down around them both.

Jack’s heart was a war drum, thudding so violently he was certain the entire class could hear it, could feel the vibrations through the desks, through the chalk-dusted air. He’s going to fall. He’s going to fall. He’s going to fall. His mind wouldn’t stop repeating it. Le Mime’s thin body was dangling from that impossible perch, his shoes scraping desperately against the stone, and Jack had no idea if the Mime could—or even would —use those strange powers to save himself. What if he couldn’t? What if he just broke apart on the concrete below, and Jack had been the only one to watch it unfold, silent, useless? The very thought made his stomach lurch and twist, until the sudden bark of the teacher’s voice snapped him back, an impossible equation scribbled across the blackboard like some cruel punishment. His hands moved with trembling fury, the chalk snapping once between his fingers, but the numbers aligned themselves as if mocking the teacher’s challenge. Jack corrected it, solved it, finished it in record time, and the stunned stammer of his teacher felt like a distant, pointless sound, drowned out by the muffled scrapes of a shoe—Le Mime struggling, Le Mime slipping, Le Mime falling. Jack’s whole body coiled like a spring. He couldn’t take it anymore. He blurted out, “Bathroom! I—I gotta go— now —like crazy bad!” He didn’t wait for permission, didn’t wait for the confusion to ripple across the classroom, he just bolted. Chased by the teacher’s voice calling his name, trying to reel him back. But Jack didn’t care, couldn’t care, couldn’t even hear beyond the frantic hammer of his pulse. He burst into the hallway, the sound of his shoes slapping against the tiles, and the last thing that filtered into his ears before the doors swallowed him whole was the voice of his teacher on the phone, hurried, concerned, summoning someone for order or for help. But Jack’s thoughts had no room for that—only one insistent, thundering need: I have to help him. I need something, anything, to pull him back in. God, what do I do? What should I do?

Jack skidded around the corner, lungs burning, sweat sticking to his collar, and when he finally burst through the side doors of the school, there he was—Le Mime, still clinging like some tragic, ridiculous gargoyle to the narrow ledge of the old stone wall. How the hell is he still there? Jack’s eyes widened; no one else was around, no one was even looking, as if the whole world had politely decided to ignore the disaster dangling right under their noses. Of course no one cares, Jack thought bitterly. They’re rich, they’re in their classes, and if they did notice, they’d just keep walking—‘not their problem.’ But he cared. Oh god, he really cared. Le Mime glanced down at him just then, and despite the tightness in his grip and the trembling strain of his arms, he smiled. A crooked, nervous smile—grateful, like Jack’s arrival was the only thread keeping him from slipping entirely. That smile hit Jack like a punch. He cupped his hands and shouted up, his voice cracking with panic, “WHAT PART OF ‘DON’T OPEN THE WINDOW FROM OUTSIDE’ DID YOU NOT UNDERSTAND, WHAT PART OF THIS SOUNDED LIKE A GOOD IDEA TO YOU!? Are you trying to kill yourself?!” Le Mime just tilted his head with that helpless smile again, shoulders shaking slightly—not from laughter, but from the effort of not falling. Jack dragged his hands through his hair, pacing beneath him, shouting up more frantically,

 “Seriously, why!? Why show yourself like that? Why climb at all? You think this is some kind of performance ? You think I can just—just watch you splat on the pavement!?” 

His voice cracked again, and he hated the way it betrayed how scared he was. “Do you even have powers that could save you if you fell?!” he demanded, chest tightening as he watched Le Mime’s feet scrabble against the wall, desperate for purchase. “Or is this just it? You fall, you die, and I’m the idiot standing here who couldn’t do anything to stop it?” Le Mime looked down again, lips pressed tight, eyes wide and shimmering with the kind of apology words could never touch. His grip slipped for a split second, his whole body lurching forward—Jack gasped so hard it hurt, his heart dropping to his stomach—before Le Mime regained hold, his free hand trembling, reaching as though he wanted to reassure Jack but couldn’t. Jack shouted louder, raw and desperate, “You don’t get to smile at me like that and then fall! You hear me!? Stay up, please! Just—just hold on, okay? Just hold on until I figure out how to get you down!”

Jack’s mind was spinning, a cyclone of panic and half-formed plans, as he yanked open the theater club door, muttering under his breath as if the words themselves could prop up the ladder he had to drag like some absurdly large, unwieldy beast across the polished floors of the campus. Oh god, oh god, Le Mime, why, why do you always have to do things that make me feel like I’m simultaneously going to vomit and have a heart attack? His hands were shaking, gripping the ladder’s rungs, sweat making it nearly impossible to hold, but he didn’t dare stop. And now I have to sneak it out of the club like some criminal, because of course the door was  locked and he had to open it in the most illegal way, of course it is, why would it be easy? Jack’s teeth clenched, and he muttered a string of words under his breath that he didn’t even hear clearly himself, a nonsensical litany of frustration and panic, punctuated by “LE MIME WHY?!” like some mantra, some desperate prayer that the mime would just stay alive until he could get there.

And then—oh no, oh no, oh no—he nearly crashed into someone. Someone real, walking with purpose, calm presence, the kind of figure that made Jack feel simultaneously guilty and relieved: Calder. Calder? No no no, what the hell, why is he here? He is supposed to be… wait, the teacher called him… oh god, right, he’s probably here to check on me, and I’m about to murder a ladder in the middle of campus and— “Calder! No! I—I’m fine, really, it’s nothing!” Jack muttered, not even sure if he was talking to himself or the other person, voice cracking at the edges. His eyes darted nervously toward the side where Le Mime clung to the ledge, as if Calder might somehow sense that absurdly precarious situation from a distance. Oh my god, the ladder, the ladder! I can’t drop it! And I can’t explain why I’m running around like some lunatic either!

“Jack I–”

Calder raised an eyebrow, clearly perplexed, but said nothing yet, watching Jack flail with a patience that almost made Jack feel worse. Don’t say anything, don’t look too closely, don’t let him know you’re losing your mind completely, Jack muttered inwardly, muttering in fragments aloud, “Okay okay okay, Le Mime’s up there, yes, up there, and he’s going to—he’s not supposed to—he’s probably going to survive but I have to get the ladder and not get caught and oh god Calder, if you see this, please just—just—don’t say anything yet.”

He shifted the ladder slightly, cursed under his breath as the metal scraped the floor, and muttered about the ridiculous weight, the cursed campus design, the fact that he should have brought the Jackbots but didn’t because he’s an idiot that tried to abandon the only somehow almost useful thing he had and now the mime might die oh god oh god oh god , his voice rising and falling in ragged bursts. Calder took a cautious step forward, hand half-raised, and Jack waved it off frantically, “No, no! I got this! I swear I got this! It’s just… heavy, it’s awkward, it’s—ohhhhhh, Le Mime why did you do this!?” He almost dropped the ladder entirely, caught it at the last second, muttering under his breath about every possible curse he could summon at the situation, at the campus, at Le Mime, at himself.

Calder, finally speaking softly, said, “Jack… are you—” but Jack cut him off, voice scrambling over itself, “No! No! I just need—just a minute! Don’t look! Don’t! It’s fine, it’s fine, don’t worry, I’ve got him! I have him, I swear!” He pivoted, balancing the ladder as if it were an extension of his body, muttering to himself the entire time, counting steps, imagining every scenario, recalculating in real-time how to get Le Mime down safely. Step lightly, don’t slip, don’t drop it, don’t let him fall, don’t let Calder see you freak out too much, don’t let the school notice anything, just—

And still, amid all that chaos, there was a flicker of control as the voice in his head—the insistent, soothing Good Jack —finally pressed in. “You can do this, Jack. One step at a time. Breathe. Don’t think about the world, don’t think about anything else. Just get him. That’s it. Focus. Focus.” Jack gritted his teeth, nodded mutely to himself, and let that voice guide him as he carefully maneuvered the ladder across the courtyard, muttering half-coherent instructions to himself, counting steps, checking his grip, all while Le Mime clung like a precarious, silent star above him. Almost there, almost there… just breathe… just don’t fuck this up…

The ladder was trembling in Jack’s hands, the metal cold, his arms aching as Calder suddenly reached out and steadied it with a calm firmness that contrasted entirely with Jack’s frantic fumbling. Calder’s voice carried that measured tone Jack had come to know too well, soothing but heavy with concern.

“Jack,” Calder began, his eyes darting upward at the precarious figure of Le Mime clinging helplessly to the sill, “why—why is the mime who sometimes performs outside the school gates here of all places? Hanging from a window? During class?”

Jack’s mouth opened, words tangling in his throat. He wanted to say a dozen things at once, excuses, inventions, half-truths, anything. Instead, what escaped was a muttered rush:

“I—uh—he was—he’s—don’t look at me like that, Calder, I was just—helping! Yeah, helping him with something and then he—he thought it’d be funny or—or some stupid joke to climb up there and—and now look at him!”

His voice cracked, high and desperate, and he jabbed a finger toward Le Mime, who only responded with that faint, helpless smile, lips pressed tight as if apologizing with silence.

Calder sighed, not unkindly. “Dangerous, Jack. It’s dangerous. This could’ve ended far worse.” His words, though reproachful, carried an undertone that caught Jack off guard: warmth. “But… I can see it. You care. Enough to risk… well, this .” His hand tightened on the ladder as if to emphasize how absurd and yet telling the situation was. “I think you might’ve made a real friend.”

Jack felt his ears burn. “He’s not—! I mean, he’s—oh, for crying out loud, Calder!” He whipped his head around to glare at Le Mime. “Why couldn’t you just stay outside ? Why the stupid stunts? You nearly got yourself killed! Do you even—do you even realize how hard it was to drag this monster of a ladder across the campus!? Everyone saw me! You nearly—”

But his tirade was cut short by a sudden slip. Le Mime’s foot missed its hold, his body teetering, gravity clawing at him—until, blessedly, the ladder Calder and Jack held steady caught him in time. The mime scrambled down with slow, jerky motions, every inch tense, until at last his shoe caught the bottom rung. But before Jack could sigh relief, Le Mime’s grip faltered again and—

“WAIT—!” Jack yelped.

Too late.

The weight of the mime came crashing down on him, knocking the wind out of his lungs. They toppled onto the ground in a graceless heap, Jack flattened beneath, flailing, muffled curses escaping as Le Mime scrambled upright with a face flushed red from shame.

Calder immediately folded the ladder down with efficient hands, his voice calm but edged with worry. “Are either of you hurt?”

“I’M hurt!” Jack wheezed from the ground, arms flailing as if to push Le Mime off. “I’m dying ! Crushed! Smothered!”

Le Mime, kneeling beside him now, looked down with wide, mortified eyes and reached out a gloved hand, almost trembling as he tried to help Jack up. Jack swatted at him but let himself be pulled anyway, muttering, “Great, fantastic, just what I needed, humiliated and concussed in the same day…”

Calder bent slightly, scanning both of them for bruises or worse, though his tone was softer now, almost gentle. “It’s awkward, yes… but it’s also telling. Jack, you ran halfway across campus with a ladder to save him. And you—” his gaze flicked to the mime, who quickly looked away, “—you trusted Jack to be there for you.”

“Don’t—don’t make it sound all sentimental!” Jack snapped, though his ears were hot. He crossed his arms tightly, still leaning against Le Mime for balance, despite grumbling, “Honestly, what were you thinking ? Climbing like that? Showing up in class windows? Are you trying to get me expelled!?”

Le Mime just smiled again—sheepish, guilty, almost apologetic—and gave a small shrug, as if words weren’t necessary.

Calder sighed once more, watching the two of them with an unreadable expression, but when he finally spoke, it was low, steady: “Well. Whatever this is, it’s real enough. Just… try not to let it end with either of you falling to your deaths, hm?”

Jack groaned loudly, throwing his arms up. “Oh, yeah, sure, because that’s exactly what I planned for my afternoon: ladder hauling, teacher suspicion, near death, and therapy session part two with my mime-friend here!”

Yet, despite the bitterness in his words, he didn’t move away from Le Mime’s side.

Jack was still on the floor, his ribs sore, his lungs aching in that dull but insistent way that made every breath feel like it was dragging gravel through his chest. And there he was, of all ridiculous places, cradled in Le Mime’s arms like some tragic hero from a silent film. Calder’s voice hovered above them, calm, patient, but edged with that professional gravity Jack had come to know too well.

“The teacher called me,” Calder said, crouching down so his shadow stretched across the floorboards, long and soft like evening light. “They said you had an ‘episode.’”

Jack groaned, tilting his head back against Le Mime’s shoulder, watching the sky as if it might offer him some divine escape. His voice came out hoarse, half a mutter and half a plea.
“An episode , really? Can’t a guy just… just have a bad day without it being filed under psychological terms? Look, Calder, if you could—just this once—cover for me…”

Calder’s expression did not shift; his eyes were steady, sharp, too perceptive for Jack’s comfort. Le Mime, silent as always, leaned closer, tilting his head with those wide, imploring eyes that carried more weight than any words could. He didn’t have to speak; the exaggerated droop of his brows, the subtle pout of his lips, the almost comic innocence in his look all spoke for him.

Calder folded his arms, studying both of them as though he were piecing together a puzzle. Finally, he exhaled, not quite defeated, but softened.
“Cover for you… I could. But only if you promise me something, Jack. No more skipping therapy. Not once. Not ever. You keep running, and you’ll collapse harder than this. Do you understand?”

Jack felt heat prickle at the back of his neck. Therapy. Always therapy. He wanted to argue, to insist he didn’t want it, but Le Mime’s eyes burned into him with such absurd intensity—pleading, almost comically exaggerated in their watery earnestness—that he found his protest shriveling in his throat.
“Fine,” Jack muttered, tugging at Le Mime’s sleeve as if to keep him from pressing closer. “Fine, I’ll go. I’ll never skip again. Happy? Now can I—”

He broke off suddenly, a sharp gasp tearing from his chest. Air seemed to vanish, collapsing out of him, leaving him clawing for breath. Le Mime’s face contorted instantly into panic, and before Jack could so much as shake his head, the mime leaned down, lips parting, clearly ready to give him mouth-to-mouth.

Jack flailed weakly, shoving at his chest with what little energy he had.
“No! No, stop—” he croaked between gasps, eyes widening in horror. “That’s not—mouth-to-mouth doesn’t even work like that ! I’m breathing! I just—just need a second!”

The mime froze, caught mid-motion, cheeks flushing red even as he tried to cover it with a theatrical shrug. His arms tightened around Jack protectively, almost possessively, as if by holding him still he could will the pain away.

Calder, ever the professional, pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed, though the corner of his mouth twitched upward with faint amusement. “I’ll go talk to your teacher,” he said at last, rising to his feet. “Convince them it was nothing more than… a misunderstanding. But remember what you promised me, Jack. Therapy. Every session. No exceptions.”

As he turned to leave, Jack slumped back against Le Mime, muttering half-coherent complaints under his breath about how absurd this all was, how embarrassing, how utterly unfair. His heart still hammered uncomfortably, but it was dulled now by the warmth pressed against his back.

And then—because the universe was cruel—he caught sight of Calder just as the man reached the door. Calder glanced back, casual, almost conspiratorial, and lifted a hand to give Jack a thumbs up. A thumbs up.

Jack’s eyes widened, his face burning red. “Oh, no. No, no, no—you don’t get to thumbs up this! This isn’t—this isn’t anything! ”

Le Mime only hugged him tighter, chin resting on Jack’s shoulder, smiling in that soft, wordless way that made Jack’s thoughts scatter. Jack groaned, dragging his hands over his face. Confused, humiliated, and trapped in a silent embrace, he muttered, half to Calder, half to himself:
“I’m never going to live this down, am I?”

After a while Jack stepped out into the courtyard, his shoes slapping softly against the wet pavement, the smell of rain heavy in the air and pressing itself into the corners of his mind. He didn’t even register the first drops; it was only when a sudden patter threatened his coat that he flinched, reflexively raising a hand to shield his head. And then, impossibly, an umbrella unfurled over him—sliding into place as if it had grown there, a crimson dome dotted with faint white stripes—and Jack’s gaze followed it up, and there was Le Mime, standing just close enough, tilting his head with that faint, apologetic curve at the corners of his lips, eyes glimmering with a wordless sheepishness.

Jack blinked, momentarily caught between gratitude and exasperation, and a slow, awkward warmth flooded him as he realized he had been scowling inwardly before noticing Le Mime had already anticipated the rain. “…Look, I—” he began, voice trembling slightly, a mix of nervous energy and the residue of the classroom disaster still clinging to his chest. “…I’m sorry, okay? Really… for snapping at you before, and, well… thank you.” His hands fiddled with the straps of his bag, tugging and twisting as if he could fold his embarrassment into something smaller. “But… you can’t just—just do that, not ever again, alright? You can’t just appear like—like some… some cartoon hero outside my class and start climbing windows and, and—” He stopped, taking a deep, shuddering breath, the umbrella shaking slightly as Le Mime shifted it to cover them both better. “And if you’re going to leave, you… leave a note. Just—just a note, so I don’t think you’re falling off the roof or—”

Le Mime’s head nodded slowly, tilting almost theatrically as if in solemn agreement, the faint curve at his lips softening in amusement at Jack’s flustered rambling. He didn’t speak, of course, but his eyes followed Jack carefully, letting him know—somehow—that he understood, that the silent apology and promise had been received, stored in that small, mime-like code of gestures that somehow spoke more than words ever could.

Jack exhaled, finally letting the tension drain from his shoulders. He rubbed at the back of his neck, feeling both embarrassed and strangely buoyed. “…Alright, alright,” he muttered, muttering more to himself than Le Mime, letting the words tumble out in a rush as if spilling them might clear the muddle in his head. “We… we need to—yeah. Library. We’ve got… research to do, investigation to figure out what the hell is going on with your powers and—” He broke off, aware of how fast he was talking, aware that his brain had skipped over some of the sentences entirely, propelled forward by nervous energy. “…Library,” he finished, quieter now, steadying himself. “Follow me.”

Le Mime inclined his head again, just slightly, almost imperceptibly, and trailed close, the umbrella shared between them, a bridge of protection over the two of them as Jack’s internal voice—the Good Jack—murmured softly in the back of his mind, reassuring, guiding. It’s okay. You’ve got this. Just keep going. You’re helping him. You can do this. Jack swallowed, letting the voice settle his thoughts, letting it carry him forward as the rain patted against the umbrella, soft and steady, a rhythm that matched the pulse in his chest. Together, they moved toward the library, each step a little steadier than the last, the silence between them filled with the quiet trust of shared understanding, and Jack thought—maybe for the first time that day—that he could actually handle this, that maybe, just maybe, this strange, silent, charming mime at his side might be exactly the person to make sense of the chaos with him.