Archive of Our Own

 Gangle’s sketchbook is the only thing that still felt hers.

The cover is bent, the pages frayed at the edges, some warped from tears she’d tried to hide. But when she opens it — when her ribbons brush over the soft grain of paper — she can almost pretend things were normal again.

She sits hunched on the cold floor, a stub of pencil in one trembling hand. The light in the room flickers in and out, throwing long, jittering shadows across the page.

She draws faces. Smiling faces. Hers, sometimes. The others’, too. But no matter how hard she tries, the smiles never look right. Too wide. Too sharp.

She presses harder, the pencil breaking.

Gangle sighs — a sound that comes out shaky, muffled through her mask. She reaches for another pencil. It’s all she can do anymore: draw, erase, draw again. Pretend the noise outside isn't real. Pretend the flickering lights aren't watching.

Her drawings used to make her feel safe. Now, sometimes, she swears they move when she isn't looking.

She tries not to look too long at the page in front of her — the one she’d started the night before. It's a picture of all of them standing together, smiling, Caine floating above them like a bright sun. But she’s drawn his teeth too sharp. And the longer she stares, the more it looks like he's watching her.

A drop of something dark — ink, maybe — splatters onto the paper.

Gangle’s hands go still.

There's a sound behind her. Soft. Metallic. Like laughter filtered through a broken speaker.

Her pencil rolls away across the floor.

She doesn't turn around right away.

The sound is faint — a warped chuckle that seems to come from the walls themselves. Gangle stares at her sketchbook, forcing herself to breathe evenly.

It’s nothing, she tells herself. Just the power flickering again. Just the noise of the system.

She reaches for her pencil, but it's rolled too far. It stops near the corner of the room, the one the light never seems to reach.

Her hands twitch.

She closes her sketchbook and crawls toward it, trying not to look directly into the dark. But as her hand brushed the floorboards, she notices something else.

Her sketchbook is open again behind her.

And the drawing she’s been working on — the smiling faces — look different.

Someone has drawn over it.

Heavy black lines now crisscross the page, tearing through the smiles. Caine’s outline is darker. Sharper. The teeth more pronounced. And one by one, the faces of her friends have been scribbled out, until only hers remained.

She freezes.

Her mask feels tight, too small, almost aching. She can hear her breathing loud inside it — quick, shallow gasps that echo.

The lights flicker again. When they come back, the sketchbook is closed. The way it should be.

Gangle’s hands shake as she picks it up. She flips through the pages, searching for the drawing — but every page is blank. Clean. Like nothing has ever been drawn there at all.

A voice, soft and far away, whispers from the corner of the room.

Her chest clenches.

She backs up slowly, clutching the sketchbook to her chest, until her back hits the cold wall. The lights flicker again, and she catches a glimpse — just for a moment — of a shape in the dark. It looks like her. Same mask. Same ribbons.

But it's smiling.

The lights go out.

____

Gangle find the others in the common room, pretending to laugh at one of Caine’s “games.” The colors are too bright. The laughter too loud. It all feels wrong — like something painted over cracks that ran too deep to hide.

She stands there for a while before speaking. “I… I think something’s wrong,” she says quietly, clutching her sketchbook to her chest.

Nobody looks up right away.

Pomni glances at her, half-smiling. “Something’s always wrong, Gangle. That’s kind of our thing.”

“No, I mean—really wrong,” she insists. “In my room. My drawings—they keep changing. And I heard—someone was talking to me.”

Ragatha’s smile falters, just slightly. “You’ve been under a lot of stress lately. Maybe you just—imagined it?”

“I didn’t imagine it,” Gangle whispers. “It was me. It looked like me.”

No one says anything.

Jax, leaning against the wall, gives a short laugh — the kind that isn't really a laugh at all. “You’re seeing doubles now? That’s a new one.”

Her ribbons droop. “I thought you’d understand,” she says softly. “You see things too, don’t you?”

That makes him pause. The smirk freezes, just for a second. He looks away.

For a long moment, neither of them speak.

Then Jax mutters, voice low, almost tired, “Yeah. What about it?”

Gangle takes a small step closer. “Then what do I do? How do I make it stop?”

He doesn't look at her when he answers. “You don’t. You just… don’t look at them. They get worse when you do.”

His tone is flat — not cruel this time, not mocking. Just empty.

Gangle swallows hard. 

____

Caine appears in her room the next morning without warning, in his usual cloud of confetti and noise. The colours hurt her eyes.

“Good morning, Gangle!” he sings, voice bright as ever. “Or is it a sad morning? Hard to tell with you sometimes!”

Gangle stiffens, clutching her sketchbook tighter. “I—I was just drawing.”

“Ah, yes! Art therapy! How delightful.” He floats a little closer, eyes gleaming. “You’ve been a bit gloomy lately, haven’t you?”

She hesitates. “I… guess so.”

Caine’s demeanour doesn't change, but something in the air did — a faint hum under the words. “You know, that sort of thing can really bring the mood down around here. And we can’t have that! The Circus runs on energy, my dear. On fun!”

“I’m trying,” she murmurs. “I just—sometimes it’s hard.”

“Well, of course it’s hard!” he says cheerfully. “But you mustn’t let it win. Sadness spreads, you see. One little gloomy thought, and suddenly everyone’s drooping. Ragatha’s forcing smiles, Pomni’s panicking again, Jax is—well, let’s not talk about Jax, shall we?”

Gangle’s ribbons curl nervously. “It’s not their fault.”

“Oh, I know. But think about it: every time you cry, every time you hide away, it pulls the whole Circus down. Even Zooble’s been complaining. You don’t want to make things worse for them, do you?”

Her breath catches. “No—of course not.”

“Then you’ll try harder to be happy!” he says brightly, as if he’s solved everything. “Smile more! Draw something cheerful! Pretend a little harder, hmm? The others will feel better if you do.”

He pats her shoulder — a gesture that feels more like a warning than comfort. “That’s what friends are for, right?”

Gangle sits perfectly still for a long time after he disappears. The lights seem too bright again. The air too still.

She opens her sketchbook to a blank page, staring down at it.

“Smile more,” she whispers to herself. “Pretend harder.”

Her hand shake as she draws a wide, exaggerated grin on the page.

But the longer she looks at it, the more it looks like its mocking her.

____

Gangle tries her best the next day.

She giggles when Ragatha trips and spills a tray of teacups, even though her voice cracks halfway through. She offers to help clean up, but Ragatha waves her off with a wary look, unsure if she's joking or not.

She complimented Zooble’s new parts — twice.

Even Jax glances over, eyebrows raised, when she chirps out, “You look good today!” in a tone that doesn't sound like her at all.

“Is that supposed to be a joke?” He asks her.

Every time she speaks, her voice comes out higher, brighter. Like someone has pulled her strings too tight.

When she isn't talking, she's smiling — wide, forced, her ribbons trembling with the effort.

At first, the others just exchange glances. But by evening, even Pomni can't take it anymore.

“Gangle, are you… okay?” she asks softly.

“I’m great!” Gangle says too quickly. “Really! Everything’s fine. Caine said I should smile more, and he’s right! Things will get better if I just—if I just keep smiling!”

Pomni takes a step back. “You don’t have to do what he says all the time.”

Gangle’s smile falters for half a second — then she forces it wider. “He just wants us to be happy. That’s all. He said my sadness makes things worse. I don’t want to ruin everything for you guys.”

Ragatha’s jaw tightens. “He told you that?”

Gangle blinks, realizing she’s said too much. “I—I shouldn’t have said—”

The lights flicker above them, once, twice. Everyone freezes.

Then Caine’s voice booms cheerfully from nowhere:

“Group activity time! Let’s keep the energy up, folks!”

Gangle’s trembling smile returns instantly. “See? Everything’s fine,” she says again, her tone lilting, glassy.

No one answers her.

Later that night, when the others are gone, she sits in front of the mirror, still smiling. Her reflection doesn't move quite right — the smile lags a little behind. The painted mouth on her mask seems wider than before.

Her reflection tilts its head — then smiles wider.

____

The others have long since drifted off, leaving the common room empty except for the soft hum of the lights. Gangle sits cross-legged on the floor, sketchbook in her lap, pencil barely moving. Across from her, Jax slumps against the couch, head drooping forward only to jerk back up every few seconds.

“Y’know…” he mumbles, voice rough, “you don’t have to sit here.”

Gangle looks up, ribbons twitching slightly. “I don’t mind.”

“You should. I’m not great company.” He gives a dry laugh that turns into a cough. “Hell, I’m barely even awake.”

“You’re still talking,” she says softly. “That’s…something.”

Jax tilts his head, eyes half-lidded. “Why do you even hang around me anymore?”

Gangle’s pencil stops moving. She doesn't look up this time when she answers. “Because no one else will.”

The silence that follows feels heavy enough to bend the air. Jax stares at her for a long time, then lets out a shaky breath that almost sounded like a laugh. “That’s…kinda pathetic.”

“I know.”

He looks away, guilt flickering through his tired eyes. “You shouldn’t waste your time on me.”

She gives a tiny shrug. “Maybe. But I don’t like seeing you alone.”

For a moment, Jax almost looks grateful. Then something shifts behind his eyes — the paranoia, the exhaustion, the sickness creeping in again.

“I don’t like you talking to Zooble so much,” he says suddenly.

Gangle blinks. “What? Why?”

“Because,” he says sharply, “it’s their fault.”

“What’s their fault?”

“Everything” Jax snaps. “All of it! Don’t you get it?”

The words hit like static in the air. Gangle flinches, hugging her sketchbook to her chest. “It isn’t their fault,” she says quietly. “It’s not anyone’s fault.”

“Of course you’d say that,” he spits. “You’re too stupid to see what’s right in front of you.”

The room goes still. Jax freezes, the echo of his words ringing in his own ears. Gangle doesn't respond — just looks down, one little tear on her mask trembling.

He swallows hard, suddenly wide awake.“...Gangle,” he mutters, voice low now, rough with shame. “I didn’t—”

“It’s okay,” she interrupts, her voice barely above a whisper. “You’re tired.”

____

When Gangle wakes the next day, the world feels thin.

 The air is still the same, the walls still hum faintly with that endless low circus tune — but something underneath it all has changed.

She finds Jax sitting at the table, elbows on his knees, staring at nothing. He doesn't look up when she enters.

“Morning,” she says softly, clutching her sketchbook to her chest.

No reply. Just the faint sound of him breathing — too slow, too shallow.

Gangle hesitates before sitting across from him. “Did you sleep at all?”

A hollow laugh escapes him. “Oh, sure. All night long. Dreamt of balloons and confetti.” His smile twitches. “Don’t worry about it.”

She frowns. “You’re scaring me.”

“Good.”

The word hits her like a slap, but she doesn't move. There's something in his voice that isn't Jax anymore — or maybe it is, but stripped down, raw and bitter.

She looks around the room, realizing with a sick feeling that everyone else is off, too. Ragatha is sitting in the corner, staring at the floor, eye glassy and wide. Zooble hasn’t come out of their room since last night. Pomni is mumbling something to herself over and over, hands twitching in her lap.

Everything feels like it’s wilting.

Gangle’s throat tightens. “Is something going on?”

Jax finally looks up, his grin tired, too wide, too practiced. “We’re entertaining the audience,” he says flatly. “That’s what we’re here for.”

“There’s no audience,” she says automatically — but even as she says it, she isn't sure.

Jax leans back in his chair, head tilted. “You keep saying that, and yet the show goes on and on and—"

"Can you just stop?" Ragatha asks. "Please."

____

It starts small.

Comments here and there — harmless things, really.

Ragatha smiling too wide when she tells Gangle to “try and look on the bright side.”

Zooble gently taking her sketchbook away, saying maybe she should draw happier things for once.

 Jax laughing whenever she cried, telling her that if she just stopped taking things so seriously, she’d stop getting hurt.

And Caine… always watching, always so pleased when she forced herself to smile.

It all sounds like help.

At least, that’s what they say.

But lately, Gangle has started to notice something strange. The more she tries to be like them — to smile when she wants to sob, to laugh when everything feels wrong — the worse she feels.

Her laughter doesn't sound right anymore. It comes out thin and hollow, like it belongs to someone else. Her ribbons stop twitching when she's scared, like they’ve learned to hide it. 

One afternoon, she finds Ragatha tidying the main room. The others are gone, for once.

“Hey,” Ragatha says brightly, turning toward her. “You look better today.”

“Do I?” Gangle asks quietly.

Ragatha nods, her eyes shining with something too practiced to be warmth. “Yeah! You’re smiling!”

Gangle touches her mask.“Am I?”

Ragatha’s smile doesn't falter.

Something cold crawls through Gangle’s chest.

Later, she finds Zooble waiting by her door, holding her sketchbook. “You left this,” they says. “We fixed some of your drawings.”

“Fixed?”

 “Yeah. Made them brighter. Cheerier.”

“You did it?”

“Well, not really. Someone did.”

She opens the book. Every face she’s drawn has been redone — smiling, eyes wide, hands raised like puppets mid-performance. Her own face is too, grinning until it hurt.

____

She finds Jax backstage.

He’s slumped in one of the prop chairs, half-lit by the flicker of the marquee bulbs. The shadows paint him in crooked stripes — a trickster’s camouflage.

“Hey,” he says without looking up. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

Gangle hesitates in the doorway. “Jax… did you change my drawings?”

That gets his attention. He looks up at her with that usual smirk, but there’s something hollow about it now — like he’s forgotten what an actual smile feels like. “What are you talking about?”

“My sketchbook,” she says. “All my drawings are all…changed.”

He tilts his head, feigning confusion. “What are you talking about?”

“I think you’re all trying to make me something I’m not.”

Jax leans forward, elbows on his knees. “And what are you, then?”

The question hits harder than it should. Gangle blinks. “I’m me.”

“Yeah?” His tone is light, but his eyes aren't. “You sure about that?”

She flinches.

He chuckles softly.“Look, Gangle, maybe we’re all just trying to help. You mope, you cry, you fall apart every other day. Maybe it’s exhausting for everyone else, y’know? Maybe we’re just… trying to make things easier.”

“Easier for who?”

The silence stretches.

For a second, something like guilt flickers across his face — but it vanishes just as quickly. He leans back again, stretching lazily. “Does it matter? You’re smiling now, aren’t you?”

Her ribbons curl around her sketchbook. “You don’t get it,” she says, voice trembling. “When I smile, it doesn’t feel like mine anymore. It feels like his.”

Jax looks at her for a long moment. The lights above them buzz softly.

Then he says, too softly, “Then maybe just try not to think about it.”

Her breath caught. “What?”

He grins, that same lopsided grin — but the look in his eyes isn't teasing anymore. “It’s easier that way,” he said. “Trust me.”

____

Caine finds her in the empty ring, sketchbook open in her lap, the pages fluttering in a phantom breeze.

 “Ah, my little artist!” he booms, voice echoing through the tent like laughter made of glass. “Still scribbling away, hmm? You know, I can’t decide whether it’s charming or… tragic.”

Gangle freezes. “It helps me think,” she says softly. “It helps me feel better.”

“Feel better,” he repeats. “Is that what you call it? Because it seems to me, every time you draw, you end up more upset.”

She hesitates. “That’s not true.”

“Oh, isn’t it? You draw something sad, and then you look sad, and then the others look sad, and then I have to fix it. Again and again. It’s exhausting, darling.”

“I just—”

He cuts her off with a low chuckle that didn’t sound amused. “You don’t need those pages. You have me.”

Her ribbons quivers. “I like drawing,” she said, firmer this time. “It’s mine.”

That was when his voice changes. The lilt drops, the warmth gone.

He leans closer, eyes bright and strange. “You don’t seem to understand,” he says softly. “Everything that hurts you… starts with those little sketches. The more you draw, the worse it gets for everyone. Do you want that?”

Gangle shakes her head automatically.

“Then don’t draw anymore,” he says, smiling again, voice smooth as silk. “I’ll take care of you. You don’t have to make anything ever again.”

She can't tell if its a promise or a command.

The smell of paper smoke always reminds Gangle of endings.

She stands in the center ring, the circus lights dimmed to a low, warm gold. Her sketchbook trembles in her hands.

Caine hovers nearby. “See? You’re doing the right thing,” he says gently. “Letting go. That’s what healing is.”

Her ribbons coil tighter around the book. “I don’t know if I want to,” she murmurs.

“Oh, sweetheart,” he says with a soft laugh. “You do. You just don’t know it yet.”

She looks down at the drawings — at every little crooked smile, every scrawled figure of her friends, all the proof she had that she was still herself.

“They’re just memories,” Caine says behind her. “Bad ones. They keep you sad. Don’t you want to be happy?”

Gangle’s throat feels tight. She wants to argue — but his words are already creeping into her head, curling around her doubts.

“Maybe,” she whispers.

“That’s my girl,”

The match flares in her trembling hand. She watches it burn for a long moment before touching it to the corner of a page. The paper curls, blackens, folded in on itself.

Caine’s voice hums softly over her shoulder: “There now. Isn’t that better?”

When the flames go out, the tent was silent again.

Gangle stares at the ashes, but she can't remember what any of the drawings had looked like.

____

Jax is sitting on the edge of the stage again, head resting in one hand, the other clutching a half-finished card trick. His eyes are half-open, bruised dark purple beneath.

When Gangle approaches, he blinks blearily at her. “You look worse than me,” he rasps. “What’s eating you, string-bean?”

“It’s… nothing.”

“Doesn’t sound like nothing.” He leans forward a little.“Come on, spill. You’ll make me look cheerful by comparison.”

That does it. Her mask quivers. “He made me,” she whispers. “Caine made me—”

Her voice breaks. She presses her hands to her face, shoulders shaking. “He made me burn them,” she manages between sobs. “All my drawings. They’re gone. Everything I made… they’re all gone.”

He just stares at her, like the words take a moment to reach him through the fog of sleeplessness.

Then, slowly, he sets the deck of cards aside and slides closer. “Hey, hey,” he says, awkwardly. “Don’t— don’t do that.”

“I can’t help it!” she cries. “They were mine! They were the only thing I had that felt like me!”

Jax rubs the back of his neck, glancing away. His grin twitches at the corners, like he’s fighting to keep it there and losing. “Yeah… I get that,” he says quietly. “When you’ve got nothing left, you hang onto whatever scraps you can. And when someone takes it…”

He trails off.

Gangle sniffles, lowering her hands. “It hurts.”

“Yeah,” he mutters. “It does.”

____

Over the next few days, Gangle finds herself drifting toward Jax without meaning to.

He’s still sharp around the edges, still sarcastic and bitter and too tired to fake things anymore — but when they're alone, he isn't cruel. Not anymore.

He’s stopped sleeping altogether now. Sometimes she’ll catch him staring into the distance, eyes glazed, mumbling things she can't quite hear. Other times, he just sits there with his hands shaking, forcing a grin that doesn't reach his eyes.

But when she sits beside him, he always quietens down.

They start meeting in the corner of the ring, where the lights don't reach as much. He’ll talk about nothing — half-broken jokes, complaints about Caine, stories that don't make sense — and she’d listen, laughing weakly just to keep him talking.

The others don't hang out with him at all anymore.

Once, when she doesn't answer right away, he nudges her with his elbow. “You’re not drawing,” he says.

“I told you,” she murmurs. “I can’t anymore.”

He frowns, gaze flicking toward her empty hands. “You could start again.”

“Caine wouldn’t like that.”

He gives a short, humorless laugh. “Since when do you care what he likes?”

Gangle’s ribbons droop. “Since he started caring what I did.”

That makes Jax pause. He looks at her for a long time, his expression softening in a way that scared her a little.

“Hey,” he says finally, voice low. “You don’t have to do everything he says.”

She wants to believe that. She wants to say it out loud. But when she opens her mouth, nothing comes out.

Instead, Jax reaches over, tugging lightly on one of her ribbons. “There,” he says. “Now you’re smiling.”

She laughs a little, even though her mask doesn't move. “That doesn’t count.”

“Sure it does.”

He leans back, staring up at the dark ceiling. “You should draw me sometime,” he adds, half-asleep, half-serious. “Maybe I’ll look less dead that way.”

“Don’t say that.”

He doesn't answer. His breathing evens out a little, finally drifting somewhere close to rest.

The next day, Gangle is in the hall, trying to keep her ribbons from shaking too much. She spent the night sitting with Jax again, watching him mumble to himself between fits of laughter. He’d barely eaten. She’d barely breathed.

Ragatha finds her by the staircase. “Hey,” she says lightly — too lightly. “You’ve been with Jax a lot lately.”

Gangle hesitates. “He doesn’t like being alone.”

Ragatha’s smile tightens. “He shouldn’t be alone. But you shouldn’t be alone with him either.”

“Why?”

Ragatha keeps her voice gentle. “Because he’s not safe right now. He’s… sick.”

“He’s just tired,” Gangle says, too fast.

Ragatha blinks. “Tired. You really don’t get it, do you?”

 “You’re making him sound like a monster.”

“He’s acting like one.”

“That’s not fair!”

Ragatha’s patience cracks, her voice low. “You don’t know what he did to me, Gangle.”

The words hit her like a slap. For a moment, Gangle can't move. 

“He hurt me,” Ragatha says. “And maybe he’s different now, maybe he’s sorry — but it doesn’t change what he did.”

Gangle swallows hard. Her hands are shaking. “He is sorry.”

“Is he? He never told me that.”

Gangle doesn't answer. She can't.

Ragatha sighs, rubbing her temples. “I’m just trying to keep you safe. That’s all. I'm trying so hard to just keep everyone safe.”

Gangle nods, but her mind is already somewhere else — back in that dark corner with Jax, where he's quieter, softer, broken in ways she understands.

“I couldn't keep him safe.” Ragatha finally adds. “I don't want to fail anyone else.”

____

Caine watches her from the corner of the room, floating in that way he always did — all presence and no sound. Gangle keeps her eyes down, pretending to read a book, but the tremor in her hands gives her away.

“You’ve been lying to me,” he says finally.

Gangle freezes. “I—I haven’t—”

“Don’t insult me. You think I don’t know when you’re hiding things? When you’re sneaking off?”

“I don’t see what the big deal is,” she whispers. “Jax is my friend.”

“Friend?” Caine’s voice cracks like static. “None of them are your friends, Gangle.”

“That’s not true.”

He floats closer. “Oh, isn’t it?” he purrs. “Then why do they laugh when you cry? Why do they look away when you talk?”

Gangle shakes her head. “They don’t hate me.”

“Yes, they do. They all do. Every last one of them. They talk about you when you’re not around, you know. They think you’re pathetic.”

“Stop.”

“Ragatha only pretends to care because she likes feeling better than you.” His voice lowers, harsher now. “And Zooble…”

Gangle’s breath catches. “Don’t—”

“Zooble hates you most of all.”

The tears spill down her mask. “Please stop—”

“If Zooble didn’t hate you,” Caine hisses, “they would’ve kept their mouth shut. They would’ve listened to me.”

“Please—please stop saying that—”

But Caine only tilts his head, voice soft again — like he’s never raised it at all.

“I’m only telling you the truth, dear girl. I’m the only one who tells you the truth.”

He reaches out, patting her shoulder with something that might’ve been affection — if not for how it makes her skin crawl.

“Now,” he says gently, “no more secrets. Understand?”

Gangle nods, trembling.

____

Jax looks worse.

Not just tired — sick. His colors seem faded, dull at the edges, like the world is bleeding out of him. He slumps against the wall beside her, his head tilted at an odd angle, mouth slightly open. Every few seconds, his hand twitches.

Gangle sits beside him, drawing her knees close. She wants to wake him. She really does. His posture looks painful, and his breathing comes in shallow, uneven bursts. But she can't bring herself to do it.

He's finally asleep.

After all this time — after all those nights of pacing and muttering and flinching at things no one else can see — he's finally asleep.

She doesn't want to ruin it.

A piece of her ribbon trembles as she reaches out, brushing a bit of dust from his overalls. He doesn't stir. His expression softens slightly.

Gangle smiles, a small, broken thing.

The quiet around them was heavy. Too heavy.

She glances toward the ceiling — the faint hum of Caine’s world above them, always watching, always waiting. She wonders if he's looking now. If he’ll see this as another mistake, another reason to scold her for “feeding Jax’s delusions.”

She hates that word — delusions.

____

Caine finds her the next day.

He doesn't announce himself the way he usually does, no flashing lights or bouncing theatrics. Just his voice — quiet, too quiet — echoing through the corridor as Gangle cleans up the mess Pomni and Ragatha have left behind while trying to bake.

“Gangle,” he says softly, and the way he says her name makes her ribbons stiffen.

She turns slowly. “Oh. Caine. I— I was just—”

He drifts closer. “Taking care of Jax again, are we?”

Gangle hesitates. “He’s not feeling well.”

Caine hums, circling her like a vulture. “Not feeling well,” he repeats, voice lilting. “That’s one way to put it.”

He stops in front of her, lowering his toothy head slightly so his eyes are level with hers. “Do you know what I think, Gangle?”

She shakes her head.

“I think you’re making it worse.”

Her breath catches. “What?”

“I think every time you go to him, whispering your little worries— it drags him down. You make him sick.”

Gangle’s ribbons tremble. “That’s not true.”

“Isn’t it? “You said it yourself, didn’t you? You care about him. And ever since then, he’s been getting worse. Sicker. Maybe your sadness spreads like a rot.”

“Stop,” she whispers.

He leans closer, voice lowering to something almost human. “I warned you before, didn’t I? About how your mood affects things. You never listen. You never listen.”

“Please—”

“Tell me, Gangle.” His tone sharpens. “Do you want him to die? Is that it?”

She shakes her head frantically. “No! I just wanted to help him—”

“Then help me,” he says softly. “Stop poisoning him with your pity. Stay away. Let me handle it.”

Her voice breaks. “But he needs someone.”

“He doesn’t need you.”

____

After that, Gangle starts keeping her distance.

It isn't easy — Jax notices almost immediately. When she’ll pass him in the hallway, he mutters something like, “You avoiding me now like everyone else?” with that crooked half-smile that never reaches his eyes. 

She’ll shake her head, stammering out a denial.

She stops sitting with him. She stops drawing — or trying to draw — at all. She stops talking much, too. Every word feels like a risk, a chance to make someone else sick, or angry, or worse.

Caine’s voice lingers in her head: You’re always making it worse.

When Jax coughs, when Ragatha cries, when Zooble doesn't come out of their room for hours, Gangle feels like its her fault. She has caused this. Her sadness, her trembling, her endless tears — they're poison.

She starts avoiding eye contact, afraid she’ll infect someone just by being seen.

Ragatha tries once to check in on her. “You’ve been quiet lately,” she says softly. “Are you okay?”

Gangle nods too quickly. “Mhm. I’m fine. Just tired.”

She regrets saying it immediately. Jax always used to say that.

Ragatha doesn't believe her, but she doesn't push. Nobody does, not anymore.

Later that night, Gangle sits alone in her room, staring at the blackened patch on the floor where her drawings had burned.

The air still smells faintly of ash, and she swears she can see faces in the charred marks — warped, blurry shapes that almost look like her friends.

Her hands twitch toward the spot where her sketchbook used to be.

Then she hears it again — Caine’s voice, low and distorted through the static of her own mind.

See? You’re calmer already. Better for everyone.

Gangle presses her hands to her face, muffling a sob.

“Better,” she whispers. “Better.”

But when she looks at herself in the mirror across the room, she barely recognises the mask staring back.

But it doesn't stop when she pulls away.

If anything, it gets worse.

The others’ voices change — not loud or cruel, not at first, but off. When Ragatha speaks to her now, there's always something behind her smile, something tight and twitching. When Zooble asks how she's feeling, it doesn't sound like concern. It sounds like they're testing her.

Even Jax has changed. He’ll go from laughing to snapping in an instant, muttering things under his breath that she can't quite hear, things that make her ribbons coil up tight around her neck.

And then there's Caine.

Caine’s everywhere now — his voice layered over the crackle of the intercom, slipping through the air vents, whispering from the blinking neon signs. Sometimes she’ll catch flashes of his grin reflected in mirrors or metal surfaces, his teeth glinting even when his body isn't there.

He’ll tell her things.

Things she didn’t want to hear.

They’re using you, Gangle.

They only keep you around because they like to watch you break.

You think they’re your friends? You think they care?

She tries not to listen. She tries covering where her ears would be, humming to drown him out, whispering over and over that it isn't real. That it's the same trick he always plays.

But then Jax says something — something that makes her stomach turn.

“You shouldn’t talk to Zooble anymore,” he tells her one morning, voice hollow, tired. “They said some things. About you.”

“What things?”

He smiles. “Just that you’ve been acting weird. That you’ve been… talking to Caine too much.”

Her voice shakes. “That’s not true. I haven’t.”

“Sure,” Jax says, leaning closer. “But I’d watch them, if I were you. They don’t like when people lie.”

That night, she finds a note under her door. The handwriting is uneven, frantic.

Stop before you make it worse.

She doesn't know who it's from.

Caine laughs for hours after that — the sound echoing through the hallways, glitching and stuttering like static.

____

The night it happens, everything is too quiet.

Gangle sits on the edge of her bed. She tries not to look at the shadows. They're thicker tonight, curling into dark corners that hadn’t existed before.

She doesn't remember deciding to stand up. Her body just moves, her mind following a few steps behind. The hallways seems to stretch longer with every turn, carnival lights flickering above her like a dying heartbeat.

When she reaches the main tent, the others were already there.

Ragatha, Zooble, Jax — all standing under the dim glow of the spotlight, their faces blank and glassy. They don't move when she steps closer. They don't even blink.

“Why… why are you looking at me like that?” Gangle whispers.

No one answers.

Then Caine’s voice rises from above them.

"You see, Gangle? They’re waiting for you. Waiting for you to admit what you’ve done."

“I didn’t do anything!” she cries, her voice trembling. “I just wanted to help!”

"Help?" Caine laughs, the sound sharp enough to split through her skull. "You spread your sadness like a plague. Look at them — look what you’ve turned them into!"

Her eyes dart between them. Ragatha’s smile is too wide, pulled tight by fraying loose threads. Zooble’s mismatched limbs twitch with static. Jax stands perfectly still, head tilted, eyes dark and hollow.

Gangle shakes her head violently. “No— you’re lying. This isn’t real.”

"Isn’t it? Then wake up, little ribbon girl. Wake up and see what you’ve done."

Something inside her snaps.

She screams, stumbling backward, clutching at her face as cracks spread across her mask. The world tilts— the tent melting into streaks of red and gold light, their shapes warping until she can't tell what's alive and what's painted.

The others move now, slow and wrong, like puppets being tugged by invisible strings.

Ragatha’s voice is too sweet, too calm. “We told you, Gangle. You never listen.”

Zooble’s voice layers over hers. “You should’ve stayed quiet.”

Jax’s laughter comes last — dry, broken, and hollow. “You should’ve just stopped looking.”

Gangle’s legs give out. She falls to her knees, sobbing, covering her face as the light bled around her.

And through it all, Caine’s voice whispers, soft and loving and monstrous. "There, there. Don’t cry, my dear. The show must go on."

The world feels quieter after.

Gangle doesn't remember leaving the tent — only the cool air pressing against her mask and the dim buzz of the hallway lights as she stumbles through them. Everything around her looks warped, softer at the edges, like she's walking through a dream she isn't supposed to be in.

She tries to keep her breathing steady. She tries not to hear Caine’s voice whispering her name from every dark corner.

Then she hears someone else.

“Gangle?”

The voice startles her so badly she stumbles back, pressing her ribbons over her face like she can hide behind them.

“Whoa, hey,” Zooble says quickly, tone softening. “It’s just me.” They look her over. “You okay?”

She doesn't answer. Her throat aches, and the words won't come. She can still see them — Ragatha’s cracked face, Jax's warped smile, Caine above them all — and if she speaks, she's afraid it will all come spilling out.

“Gangle?”

Her body starts shaking before she can stop it. “I… I can’t—” she chokes out.

 Zooble pushes themselves unsteadily to their feet, swaying like the floor tilts beneath them. “Hey, hey, don’t— don’t cry,” they say, voice quiet now, careful.

They reach for her hands — touch warm but trembling — and gently guides her down until they were both crouched on the floor.

“Talk to me,” Zooble murmurs.

She shakes her head, sobs catching in her throat. “I don’t want to. You’ll think I’m crazy.”

“I already think everyone’s crazy,” They say. “Doesn’t matter. Just… breathe, okay?”

Gangle tries, but every breath feels jagged. Zooble holds her hands tighter.

When Gangle finally looked up, Zooble spoke, voice soft. “Whatever he did,” they say slowly, “you don’t have to deal with it all alone.”

She wants to believe them. She really does.

But from somewhere down the hall, faint and cheerful and too close, Caine’s voice whispers through the air vents:

Oh, but she does.