Archive of Our Own ^beta

Jack wasn’t born in Jasper, Nevada.

They’d moved there, way back when he was a kid.

Before his mom and his dad looked at each other strung out and tired, until the day his dad just quietly took his things and left, and it was Jack and his mom against the world.

Way before that.

Back when he was three or four, he doesn’t remember.

They’d moved there, even though his mom had only moved out years before for school.

For school had always felt thin, even when he was a kid.

He sort of starts to get why, looking back on everything.

Hindsight is 20/20.

Jack is six years old when he hears the first rumors about what happened in Jasper in the sixties.

They say that the water ran electric-blue.

That the sky swarmed with planes and helicopters.

That there was something else going on at those unmarked military bases, something more than weapons or vehicle storage.

They said that the aliens hadn’t hit Roswell.

They said that the aliens had hit Jasper.

Jack is seven when he sees the blue motorcycle and its rider for the first time.

He doesn’t know who she is, and he doesn’t think anybody’s ever gotten a glimpse of her face past the helmet, but her bike is probably the coolest thing he’s ever seen.

Even he knows that something that nice and polished doesn’t belong in a small, dusty town like Jasper.

But she’s there anyway, driving through the intersections at odd hours, disappearing into the desert for days before driving back and weaving into the far depths of the neighborhood where he’s never dared to follow.

It would be weird.

Even if he just wants to talk about her bike.

He settles for catching glimpses and leaves it at that.

Jack is eight when he hears the first rumors about the blue motorcycle and “her ilk”.

Kids dumber than he was that followed, adults that had nothing better to gossip about.

The blue motorcycle and its rider lived at a big house on the edge of the neighborhood, one with a large garage built separately from the rest and a giant blue and red semi.

There were other cars, an orange and white ambulance, a solid green off roader, a black and yellow muscle car, a red Dodge with a custom hood ornament, but the semi was what everyone talked about.

It went off the radar for weeks at a time before returning, usually singed or dented.

No one knew what was carried in the trailer, but sometimes, the other cars rolled out of the back, beaten and scratched.

Torn into.

Carved up.

The motorcycle woman had come after, separately, just a couple years back at the same time as the bright red car with the bullhorns on its hood.

And the rumors about that house ran rampant.

Jack was eight but it still wasn’t hard to overhear the adults that thought no one was paying attention.

And he listened.

They talked about all sorts of things, but everyone loved to talk about the house.

About the man that drove the semi, tall and imposing with his leather jacket that matched the semi’s paint job and a gray bandana around his face.

About the man in the lab coat who worked on all the vehicles, just a little shorter than the tall man, with gnarled, scarred arms, and a scowl on his face.

About how close they were.

It was a small town.

People talked.

It didn’t stop at them though.

There were people in that house that raised even more questions, like the boy that drove the muscle car.

His throat was scarred over almost all the way around, and he never spoke. Just went on drives for days on end before returning covered in dust.

The off roader’s driver was the one seen away from the house the most often, and the only one that people could say they’d really talked to. He was tall and big, but still not taller than the semi’s driver.

That guy was like a giant.

And then there was the motorcycle woman and the man with bullhorns on his car’s hood.

People saw the motorcycle woman all the time, but sparingly. She never hid, but she never lingered. Always from one place to the other.

Bullhorns was almost never seen out of his car, but he laughed loud enough to be heard from across the street. When he was seen away from the house, it was chasing motorcycle woman’s dust.

They were the most exciting thing to happen to Jasper since the sixties.

But nobody could really, confidently say how long exactly they’d been there.

Jack is nine when he meets the motorcycle woman.

It’s an accident.

A literal accident.

Like, vehicle collision accident.

It’s late, his mom driving them home from a movie out of town, when they see the motorcycle on the side of the road, dented, the rider only a couple steps away leaning up against a rock.

Jack vaguely notes that there aren’t any foot steps leading to where she’s propped up as his mom pulls over.

It looks a lot like someone hit the motorcycle dead on and it went sliding, the sides scraped up and a trail of paint and skid marks painting the path the bike took across the asphalt.

The woman looks fine though, so maybe she saw whoever it was coming and jumped.

For a moment though, when his mom is stepping out, head turned away, the woman almost looks… transparent.

Like she isn’t really there.

Like a ghost.

And then Jack blinks and she looks solid again.

“Are you alright?” His mom says into the dark, and the woman’s helmet nods once.

The sluggish, half asleep part of Jack’s brain wonders if she even has a face under there at all.

“Jumped before they hit,” the woman says, something about the cadence of her voice… off. “I’ve done dumber things on worse terrain, though. I’ll be alright. You can head on home.”

His mom hesitates, and Jack hops out of the car to look at the woman from behind her.

“Are you sure?”

The woman–

She–

She takes off her helmet.

His mom goes still.

Jack isn’t sure if it’s because of the woman’s dyed tips or because of the long scar under her left eye.

He’s a little thrown himself.

Because the woman never takes off her helmet.

Never.

It was like the rules.

But she just did.

She just took it off.

And she smiles, crooked and… and he doesn’t even know what that look is.

Like something a pirate would wear.

“I’ll be okay,” the woman says, scar crinkling right under her eye as she talks. “I’ve already called for a tow.”

Her eyes are really, really blue.

When her head tilts away from the headlights, just for a moment, they look like they glow.

But–

Jack is just tired.

People don’t glow.

Then there’s a blaring horn that sends all three of them jumping.

The woman almost looks like she glitches.

Flickers out of existence.

Jack is just tired.

“Way to make an entrance,” she mutters, and Jack turns to see–

Oh.

The giant red and blue semi.

He’s never seen it before in person.

But it’s hard to miss the paint job.

It rolls to a stop, and the giant steps out.

He’s gotta be over six feet tall, strange headphones over his ears and a bandana drawn up over his nose.

Jack can almost see a scar peeking out from the seam of the fabric over his face.

The man pauses, taking him and his mom and the woman all in with a long look.

And then he sighs.

“R.C.,” the man says gently, in a deep voice that definitely matches his height, “are you alright?”

It feels almost like his voice is vibrating through the air like thunder, or through the ground like an earthquake.

All around.

The woman– R.C.?– groans.

“I’m fine, boss.” She grumbles.

Boss?

The man raises an eyebrow as he pulls off the headphones.

“Is that so?” And then he casts a meaningful glance at the bike.

R.C. purses her lips.

It looks more like a grimace.

“Mostly fine,” she allows.

The man casts another glance at them, and his gaze lingers on Jack for a second, before looking his mom in the face.

“Is it not late?” He asks into the darkness. “What are you two doing out here? If you do not mind my asking.”

The giant talks weird.

Very formal but… warm?
Kind.

His mom smiles, suddenly a little strained.

He doesn’t know why.

“Movie in another town,” she explains. “Happened upon, um, R.C. here and pulled over to see if she was alright. I’m a nurse,” his mom tacks on at the last second.

The man’s eyes crinkle in the corners.

“That was very kind of you… ?”

His mom hesitates.

Just for a second.

And then she says, “June.”

The giant nods.

“I am Orion,” the man says, and his mom relaxes like it’s some sort of peace offering.

“Like the stars?” Jack hears himself ask.

Orion looks back towards him with a tilt of his head.

His crows feet crinkle even more.

“Exactly like the stars.” Orion answers patiently.

That’s pretty cool.

“I’m Jackson,” he says, stepping a little bit further out from behind his mom. “But I like Jack.”

Orion looks at his mom for a long second before stepping closer and then down to one knee, level with Jack.

“It is my pleasure to make your acquaintance, Jack.” He says very seriously, holding out one hand.

Jack takes it.

“It’s nice to meet you too, Orion.”

He thinks R.C. laughs a little, maybe just a cough, and hears a sound that might be his mom wheezing.

It is allergy season.

“Is R.C.’s bike going to be okay?” He asks when Orion lets go and starts to stand back up.

He stops in the middle of it, hovering in a sort of awkward position before straightening out.

Then he looks at Jack’s mom.

“Would you mind if Jack assisted me in straightening out R.C.’s motorcycle, June?”

His mom looks conflicted, for some reason, and Jack clasps his hands together, just a little.

“Please, Mom?” He asks quietly. “It’s like, the coolest bike in the whole town.”

R.C. goes a little pink in the face at that, embarrassed, almost, and Orion laughs a little behind his bandana.

His mom glances between all of them and the bike for a few seconds before leaning back against the car.

“As long as you do most of the heavy lifting,” she finally says to Orion. “And only because you,” she points at Jack, “are going to be on your best behavior starting now and until Tuesday.”

He smiles.

“Got it!”

Orion laughs a little again, and steps further into the light of the headlamps, closer to the bike and closer to R.C.

Jack trails after him, stepping into his footprints.

His mom’s face goes a little sad from where she’s perched.

She does that a lot, lately.

Orion crouches down beside the bike, then, and Jack snaps back to him.

He levers his hands under the side of the bike to the road and tips his head for Jack to do the same, and together, they push the bike to a stand.

Orion does most of the work, but Jack helps, telling him to hold it and then pushing out the kickstand so that it can rest on its own.

The left side is scraped and dented, the right dented hard, almost crushed, and R.C. grimaces at the sight of it.

“Doc’s gonna go postal,” she whispers with what might be horror and Orion sighs quietly.

“I will talk to him.” He tells her, and some of the stiffness of her shoulders leaks out.

“You’re a life-saver.” She breathes, finally pushing herself up from the rock.

Maybe she isn’t as fine as Jack thought, because she holds her right arm close, and her right leg has a limp.

Maybe she didn’t jump out of the way early enough.

“To the cab, R.C.,” Orion says, grabbing her shoulder. “You have done enough for one night. I will take care of things from here.”

She doesn’t even say anything after that, just gives a parting wave and a glance over her shoulder to Jack and his mom.

His mom… goes a little pink?

Orion watches her until there’s the sound of the passenger door opening and closing before he looks back at them.

He tugs down his bandana, and there’s a long scar up his jaw and cheek, but his smile is warm.

“Thank you for your assistance, Jack and June.”

His mom turns back to him, pushing off the car.

“You’re welcome, Orion,” she says, and she doesn’t say his name as stiffly as before. “Try not to run into any more trouble on the way home, yeah?”

Orion’s grin turns kinda one sided. 

“We will do our best, June.” He starts to wheel the bike away. “Safe travels to you both.”

They get back in the car, and the semi is already driving away when Jack is done putting on his seat belt.

His mom’s knuckles are tight around the steering wheel.

The semi’s taillights get pretty far away, and they still don’t move.

“Hey Mom?” Jack asks hesitantly. “Are you okay?”

His mom smiles, but it doesn’t look quite right.

“She looks exactly the same,” his mom whispers, “as the first day I saw her.”

He blinks in surprise.

“You know her?”

His mom’s smile becomes even more brittle.

“We were almost in a crash together.” She explains softly. “Me, her, your father, and the person that hit us all. It was a cascade. She looks exactly the same.”

Jack doesn’t understand.

“Why is that weird?”

She doesn’t even bother with her smile anymore, leaning her head on the steering wheel.

“Because Orion had picked her up afterwards, and he looks the same too, and–” she licks her lips, voice getting softer, “and that was over eleven years ago.”

Jack is nine and a half years old and looking through the window during his english class when R.C. looks up from where she’s waiting in traffic, catches his eyes through the glass, and waves.

He waves back.

Jack is ten when a new couple moves into Jasper, on the exact opposite side from Orion and R.C.

They run a repair shop that doesn’t charge near enough for their services.

One of them drives an almost armored truck, and the other a blood red sports car.

The lizard part of Jack’s brain looks at them and says run.

Jasper has a lot of car crashes and accidents.

Jack knows because his mom will sometimes mention over the phone to her old friends how the hospital never seems to run out of them.

Most of them aren’t too severe, she says, but they still get an unusual amount for such a small town.

Always have.

Jack wonders if it has anything to do with what ran R.C. off the road that night in summer.

Orion and R.C. seem to pop in and out of his life for the next year.

He’s also beginning to suspect that it stressed his mom out.

R.C. waves to him whenever she’s in traffic or idling at a gas station, and Orion’s started leaving in the daytime hours instead of driving back in the wee mornings when no one knew he was gone, and every time, he waves to Jack when he’s biking to school.

One time R.C. even stopped going where she was going to pull close to the sidewalk and talk to him on his way home.

It was… strange.

But he liked it.

There was always something about them slightly off, though, like they’d stepped halfway out of reality.

The way their shadows fell or their voices sounded.

Jack got used to it.

But that didn’t mean it wasn’t there.

That didn’t mean he didn’t see it.

Jack figures out with time that the rumors about Orion and R.C. and all their friends never end.

There’s always something new.

There’s always something to be added.

There’s always more gossip because people love to talk.

More gossip about Orion and the lab coat man, more gossip about the boy with the torn up throat, more gossip about R.C. and the man with the bullhorns on his hood.

More gossip about the only boy in town they talk to.

People gossip.

People talk.

Jack gets used to that too.

There’s something about seeing someone glitch out of existence that never leaves your mind.

Something about it that digs in roots and makes a home.

Those aren’t the kinds of rumors around Jasper that he hears, so he holds them close to his chest.

R.C. flickered out of reality.

Orion’s voice carried way too far.

His mom had said they hadn’t aged in over eleven years.

Their eyes maybe maybe glowed.

The couple that own the repair shop, their shadows were never right.

He’s never seen any of them eat, or enter restaurants or grocers.

They go to the hardware store sometimes.

Pick up things from the post office.

But there’s inconsistencies.

There’s things that don’t add up.

The muscle car goes for drives that last days before coming back.

R.C. disappears into the desert where there’s no shelter or food or water with nothing on her bike for hours.

The lab coat man is always working on their vehicles, always fixing something broken, something damaged, something dented.

They say the water ran electric blue in the sixties, twenty years after Roswell.

Jack wonders, if you went far enough down the water table, would it still run neon?

The repair shop is something people go to for maintenance, not to linger and look.

Jack is eleven and goes anyway.

Well.

He sort of goes anyway.

His bike is damaged.

Vince broke the break lines and the spokes, and that’s not something he can really fix on his own.

He’s eleven.

His mom doesn’t know how either, and the shop does repairs of any kind.

It says so on their little sign.

Hours are whenever we feel like written in a neat hand, and then under that, slightly blockier, says Will fix anything.

He’s not sure if they mean kid’s bikes, but he doesn’t really care.

Biking is faster than walking.

So he needs to get it fixed, and they're the first people that came to mind.

Jack doesn’t actually know who the repair shop owners are.

A little part of his brain says that he doesn’t know what they are.

And maybe they set a bad feeling in his gut, and maybe the lab coat man would fix his bike if he asked Orion to ask him, but that’s not his job.

Fixing things, that’s these people's job.

And maybe… maybe he wants to find out what they're up to.

Why they’re here.

Because they're the same kind of halfway out of reality that R.C. and Orion are.

Jack hasn't seen them personally, up close, but his mom had said things about their shadows before when something in the car stopped working.

About the shapes being… wrong.

He’s gotten too used to the offness of R.C. and Orion, though.

He’s gotten too comfortable.

Because when he steps into Kaon Repairs, it’s not the haziness of the large man behind the counter that unsettles him.

It’s the simple static floating out of the radio on the counter.

The big man looks up at the sound of the bell from the door, and his edges snap into clarity.

Jack pretends he doesn’t notice.

It's only polite.

The man takes one look at his bike, with it’s busted spokes and cut lines, and grimaces.

He thinks maybe the man doesn’t know how sharp teeth are supposed to be, or maybe he just doesn’t care.

Either way, Jack thinks maybe they aren’t supposed to be that close to fangs.

“What happened to that sorry thing?” The man asks leaning over the counter, voice deep and carrying in the small space.

It’s not too much for a closed room.

Not like Orion and his open space and vibrating tenor.

But only just.

“Bully at my school,” Jack says easily. He’s eleven. He can talk to people on his own. “Do you have parts?”

The man makes a face, and grumbles something he doesn’t understand.

He hasn’t glitched yet.

Only gone hazy.

Then he says, “Wait here,” and steps through a doorway covered by fabric separating the entrance from another room.

Rooms?

Whatever.

Jack looks around.

There’s lots of posters on the walls, ones for movies and a couple of space.

Nebulas and star clusters cushioned between Back to the Future and Real Genius.

There’s a muted grumbling from the other room, almost like an engine, and Jack quietly files it away in the back of his mind as something we don’t think about.

The big man steps out after another minute filled with static and a quiet rumble that vibrates through the floorboards.

“We’ll fix the bike,” he says gruffly. “Twelve dollars. Cash only. Leave it here and come back tomorrow. We don’t have the parts yet. Just– leave it leaned up against the wall, yeah, right there.”

Jack steps away hesitantly.

He doesn’t think people are supposed to have gold irises.

He doesn’t think this guy knows that.

And Jack finds himself saying, “Your teeth are too sharp to be a human’s, and we don’t have gold eyes. You should hide it better.”

The man goes still, and then blinks long and slow.

It’s quiet for another long minute, static rattling through his ears.

And then the man smiles, slowly at first, before laughing so loud and so big that he slaps the counter and shakes with the force of it.

Jack leaves him to it, and he can hear it ringing in his head the whole way home.

It was too deep.

It had too much echo.

It rang too loudly through his bones like it was traveling through the ground.

You should hide it better.

The other owner is there when he picks up his bike the next day.

His hair is a bright red that almost matches the car outside, and dark almost-black at the roots.

He leans almost casually against the big man, arms crossed, and Jack thinks his nails are more like claws than anything.

The big man’s eyes are brown now, though.

Closer to hazel, and when he makes a face at the other owner, his teeth are duller too.

He’s hiding it better.

The red-haired owner smiles when Jack steps through the door, money burning a hole in his pocket.

“The human child,” he says like it’s perfectly normal and not at all strange. Like he isn’t wearing a human skin right in front of him. “I don’t believe we were introduced.”

“No,” Jack says, holding the handlebar of his bike in one hand and his money in the other, “I don’t think we were.”

The owner grins even wider, edging away from his tiny grin into something more like a smirk.

Like a cat that got the canary.

“I,” he starts with a flourish of a hand to his chest, “Am Doctor K. O. Aston. You may call me Doctor.”

Then he jabs a thumb at the large man, who easily leans out of the way before it can hit him.

“And this is my partner, B. D. Aston. You may call him Blake. He’s not a doctor.”

Jack puts his money on the counter, and grabs both handles of his bike.

Both of their outlines are solid.

Their shadows are concrete.

But there’s something about how Doctor Aston moves that isn’t quite right.

Too graceful.

Too even.

Too smooth.

“K.O. like a knockout? In a game?” He asks instead of thinking about that as the big man– Blake– takes his money, flips through the bills, and tucks them under the counter. 

Doctor Aston grins with all his teeth then, suddenly, like Jack just got the punchline of some secret joke.

“Exactly.” He drawls as Blake rolls his eyes.

They aren’t gold anymore.

They aren't.

He listened.

He’s hiding it better.

But hiding what?

What are they all hiding?

What are they running from?

“Thanks for fixing my bike.” He manages to say before he can get too lost in spirals and theories and suspicion.

Doctor Aston leans away to rest against the wall, crossing his arms.

“It was our pleasure… ?”

He swallows.

Doctor Aston gave him their names.

It's only polite to give them his.

“Jack.”

Then Blake interrupts before Doctor Aston can say anything else weird or vaguely threatening.

“The tires are new, and the spokes are stronger,” he tells Jack over Doctor Aston’s grumbling. “There wasn’t a whole lot we could do to reinforce the break line, but the wheels should be tougher at least. If they’re damaged again, though, don’t just take back here first.” Blake makes direct eye contact with him then, direct eye contact with irises that just yesterday were unnatural molten gold. “Punch the guy that messed with your bike. Doesn’t matter how sorry a thing it is. Attack on it is an attack on you.”

Doctor Aston pats his arm consolingly.

“Calm yourself, Blake,” he coos quietly, sounding kind of like he’s trying not to laugh. “You’ll scare the squishy.”

Blake exhales sharply, and leans back against the wall too.

“Run along now, human–”

“I’m not scared of you.” Jack interrupts Doctor Aston.

He raises an eyebrow after a moment, and his eyes, they don’t look brown anymore.

They look red.

“Oh?” Doctor Aston asks very quietly, the air feeling very, very different now. “And why is that?”

Jack takes a deep, steadying breath.

It'll be okay.

He's not scared.

“Because I met Orion and R.C. first,” he says very firmly. “And in the middle of the night when I was nine. That’s a lot scarier than two guys in a repair shop that fixed my bike.”

Doctor Aston slowly leans away from the wall, carefully setting his elbows down on the counter with those red, red eyes.

They aren’t a trick of the light.

They aren’t.

“Is that a challenge?” Says Doctor Aston’s mouth, but the sound seems to rumble up through his feet from the ground.

It’s familiar.

And he's not scared.

Jack sets his jaw.

“No, Doctor Aston.” He says quietly. “Just a fact.”

Blake looks away from them with a hand over his face.

“Imagine that,” he mumbles in a voice soft enough that Jack is pretty sure he’s not supposed to hear. “Someone more afraid of the big man than us.”

It takes Doctor Aston another moment to drag his head away and look at Blake.

“Stranger things have happened.” He muses with eyes that aren’t red red red.

Blake makes a tired face at him.

“Maybe,” he mutters. “Maybe not.”

Then he looks at Jack.

“Get outta here, kid.” He says in that voice that fills the space only just not wrong. “If that thing gets damaged again, you bring it back. Punch the guys lights out, and then bring it back.”

Jack manages a thumbs up.

“Got it.”

Blake nods once.

“Good. Now scram.”

And Jack does.

They never say where exactly they think the aliens in the sixties hit Jasper.

Just that they did.

Just that they were there.

Jack wishes they would say something more concrete.

Something more than the town or the desert.

Something more than whispers about the mesas and the military bases.

Something more than half-thought rumors and lunch break table-top gossip

Jack wants to know what makes water neon.

What makes it run electric blue.

If it’s something he should look for.

If it means something’s wrong.

If it means something bad.

Aliens aren’t like humans, right?

So they aren’t made of the same things, don’t eat the same things, don’t drink the same things.

Don’t bleed the same things.

What was the neon blue?

Was it fuel, or chemicals? 

They aliens must’ve gotten there somehow.

Drink?

Some sort of liquid food?

Even aliens needed something to survive, right?

Was it blood?

What was it?

What made the water run blue?

And where did the supposed aliens go?

R.C. passes by his house after he’s hopped off his bike to lift the garage door, the red car with the bullhorns driving next to her, when she loops around and pulls to a stop in his driveway.

Jack can almost see the collective ripple as all the nosey neighbors poke their heads through their curtains.

For whatever reason, R.C. saying hi is always a spectacle.

They’re both pretty good at pretending not to notice though.

Out of practice more than anything, but Jack isn’t sure R.C. ever really cared in the first place.

She doesn’t seem bothered by a lot of things.

Jack leans his bike up against the garage wall while R.C. gets off her motorcycle and takes off her helmet.

The pink ends of her hair never seem to fade.

Jack thinks that maybe she doesn’t know it’s supposed to, so it never does.

The red car loops back around but doesn’t pull in the driveway, and R.C. waves him forward and away from the garage.

He can hear a grumble as R.C. says something to the driver, unintelligible or in a language he doesn’t know, it could be both, but then the man gets out and he is.

Hm.

Taller than R.C. but barely, with a red flannel shirt and close cut hair.

“So this is him,” the man says to R.C. and she makes a face.

“Jack,” she says, gesturing to the man, “this is Cliff. Cliff, this is Jack. Him and his mother helped me out when I got pushed to the side of the road, remember?”

Something in Cliff’s face goes dark.

“I remember,” he rumbles, before his face goes suddenly bright. “Hey! I didn’t get to thank you for that, kid. Thanks for looking out for my buddy here. It’s a full time job, you know? Still, can’t be everywhere at once.”

Jack blinks.

“You’re welcome. R.C.’s pretty cool.”

Cliff grins at that, and R.C. starts to go pink again.

“Kid’s a genius.” He says to her darkening face, before sighing and putting his hands on his hips. “I gotta go talk to the bossman, but we’ll chat some other time, yeah?”

Jack nods. 

“Sure.”

Cliff gives him a thumbs up.

“Then it’s settled.” He claps R.C. on the shoulder. “Don’t stay out too long, you hear? Be safe and all that.”

R.C.’s face gets even pinker, edging somewhere into red.

“Cliff–”

“I’m just saying!” He says as he runs back to his car. “You’re accident prone!”

R.C. makes like she’s going to throw her helmet at him.

“I am not.”

Cliff laughs as he ducks into his car.

Jack thinks the engine might’ve started half a second too early.

Maybe.

Maybe.

R.C. scowls at his taillights and throws up her hands.

That’s when his mom’s car pulls around the corner.

It’s… 

Really early.

Weird.

R.C. sees it right after he does, he thinks, and that’s what has her moving her bike further to the left side and closer to Jack so that his mom can pull into the right side of the drive.

She does it like her bike barely weighs anything.

This close, he can tell that her scar is old, and really, really close to her eye.

Like someone tried to take it out.

Like she’s had it for a really long time.

Jack kind of wonders what it is R.C. does.

Why she goes driving off into the desert.

Why Cliff had called Orion the bossman.

Why Blake heard Orion and thought it was weird Jack would be more afraid of him than them.

Jack wonders.

He wonders.

And then his mom steps out of her car, brushing her hair behind her ear and there's no more time to think about whys.

“Hey, June,” R.C. says with a smile.

“R.C.” His mom says back, and he doesn’t know why but her face goes a little bit pink. “Jack. How was school?”

He shrugs.

“It was okay.” He answers, because, like, it's school. Not great, not terrible. “Why are you home so early?”

His mom smiles, and it’s kind of lopsided.

She holds up her hand, and that’s when Jack sees the big brace around her wrist.

“Simmons dropped the box we were bringing in and almost broke my wrist.” She explains before panic or worry can really start to set in. “The delivery guy needed some help, it was slow… Simmons usually has steadier hands, but, you know. Accidents happen.”

“Oh,” is what he says. “How long are you going to be home?”

His mom shrugs.

“Just until this is healed. Mary doesn’t want me to strain it more than it is and make it take even longer to heal, so maybe a bit longer after that. Just to be safe.”

“About two weeks,” R.C. says to Jack. “If it isn’t bad.”

His mom pauses, and she looks almost surprised.

Then it shifts to something more calculating.

“That’s right,” she says slowly. “You sprained one before?”

“No,” R.C. replies, “but a friend of mine did.”

Jack makes a face at that.

He's seen her flicker.

He doesn't think she actually can get damaged.

The only time he's even seen her even wince is when he first met her, and her bike was dented and scratched halfway to horrifying.

“The muscle car?” Jack guesses so that R.C. won't have to make up even more of a lie on the spot.

She looks surprised at him, for just a second, and then she smiles.

“The muscle car.” She nods. “B’s a bit… clumsy, sometimes.”

“It’s getting late,” his mom suddenly says, and they both look back to her. She seems to struggle with something for a moment, before carefully saying, “Would you like to stay for dinner, R.C.?”

R.C.’s whole face goes blank, and then surprised, and then pink.

Very pink.

“Um.” She pauses for a long moment. “I need to get back soon.”

Jack thinks his mom almost lets herself look sad, then.

She’s really bad at being sad, nowadays.

“Ah,” she says. “I understand–”

“I don’t think I can stay for dinner,” R.C. interrupts softly. “But I do think I can stay for a little while.”

His mom blinks once, twice.

R.C.’s ears start to go red.

Jack doesn’t understand what’s happening.

“Are we going in?” He asks, and they both seem to snap back to reality.

Not literally, though.

R.C. doesn’t glitch out this time, just seems to startle back into her skin.

“Er, yeah, Jack.” She says with a glance to his mom, who's already digging into her purse for the keys. “We’re going in.”

Jack nods at that.

“Alright. Do you know algebra?”

R.C. makes a face.

It's not a happy one.

“Yes.”

“Cool,” Jack says despite that. “Can you help me with my homework?”

R.C. makes another face.

“I don’t understand the concept of homework,” she says with a frown. “But I think I can help you with your algebra.”

“Awesome.”

And when Jack looks out of the corner of his eye, he thinks that his mom might be smiling.

He starts keeping a journal.

A little thing that fits in his pocket so he can write stuff down when it happens or when he remembers.

Just.

Full of small notes.

Cars to names and names to things that don’t add up.

Doctor Aston and Blake are on one side.

Orion, R.C., Cliff, and B, the muscle car driver, are on the other.

He doesn’t know the name of the off roader’s driver yet, or the lab coat man.

He might though.

Eventually.

If things keep falling into place like they are.

If Jack keeps running into the things that go bump in the night.

He’s gotten used to it.

And it feels sort of like the kind of thing that starts and then never stops.

Jack isn’t stupid.

He’s twelve.

He knows when he’s talked about.

He just also knows how to ignore it.

It gets easier with time.

What’s harder to ignore is people asking him about it.

About R.C. or Orion or the Astons.

Especially when it’s someone like Vince getting in his face.

Someone like Vince who’s cut his brakes again.

Probably because it's easy.

Probably because Jack isn't violent.

He isn't a pushover, but he would rather avoid a fight than start one.

He doesn't want to fight, even as Blake’s words ring in his ears.

Jack probably wouldn’t have done anything if Vince had only cut his brakes.

But this time, he doesn’t just do that.

He drags his mom into it.

And that?

That's not something he can stand for.

That's not okay.

It never will be.

Ever.

And when he lunges, Vince is too shocked to fight back.

Jack is suspended for fighting, but Vince is suspended for longer for deliberately damaging Jack’s bike.

So there’s that.

Little victories.

His mom is kind of mad at him, less so when he explains why he hit Vince, and his brakes are busted again.

The spokes are okay though, too tough to be cut through or kicked in.

But the lines are shot.

So he goes back to Kaon Repairs.

Blake is standing behind the counter, radio static filling the air.

He eyes Jack and his damaged bike expectantly.

“Well?”

“I broke his nose and got suspended.”

And that's when Blake grins with all his human teeth.

“Atta boy.”

R.C. never stays all the way to dinner.

She always leaves right before the food is done, and Jack never ends up setting a third plate.

He wouldn’t mind R.C. having dinner with them, though, or Orion or any of the others, but he doesn’t think they actually eat.

Which is a weird thought to have about somebody.

That you don’t think that they eat.

But Jack is almost sure it’s true.

They don’t eat.

Human food, anyway.

They probably eat something else.

Something made for their actual bodies and not the projections they throw against the world and it’s walls.

Jack isn’t sure how they do it, or what they are.

He hasn’t been sure since the day he met R.C.

He doesn’t think he needs to know, though.

Not when he’s already come this far.

He just kind of wishes he knew what they ate.

Because then maybe R.C. could stay.

Vince will probably end up picking on him until he graduates from highschool, and that’s… what it is.

Maybe he’ll mellow out with time.

Maybe he won’t.

Breaking his nose and getting him suspended hasn’t really stopped him.

He still picks on Jack, still tries to damage his bike.

He’s just more careful about when and where he does it now.

But he never mentions Jack’s mom again.

Not even once.

And all it took was a blotch on his record.

Suspended for fighting.

But hey.

No sacrifice, no victory.

There are neighbors around his house, the same ones that watch when R.C. visits, that he knows to avoid.

Avoid like he should’ve avoided the repair shop before he got Blake invested in the bike of some “squishy human”, to use Doctor Aston’s words.

It was a thin investment, but Blake still smiled when Jack came into Kaon Repairs, smiled with all the teeth he hadn’t known the shape of at first, so he was obviously doing something right.

Get the monsters to know you, to like you, and you’ll come out the other side intact.

Settle yourself at the eye of the hurricane, and maybe it’ll all be fine.

Blake and Doctor Aston weren’t like R.C. and Orion.

When he’d first seen them he’d thought run.

They don’t do that anymore.

Through practice and familiarity, they don’t do that anymore.

Maybe he should be scared, but at least he knows why they say and act the way they do.

They aren’t like him.

They’ve always been that way.

His neighbors?

Jack doesn’t know why they act the way they do.

He doesn’t know why they watch and whisper when his mom and R.C. talk.

He doesn’t know why they eye him warily and move their children away.

Jack doesn’t understand.

They’re humans, but they just.

They don’t act right or normal.

They don’t.

And Jack would rather be alone with Doctor Aston than any one of his human neighbors if he could help it.

Jack is twelve and three quarters when Orion rolls into town at the crack of dawn, and the only reason why Jack sees him is because he couldn’t get back to sleep.

Figuring out how to fix his own bike from the instructions Blake gave him is kind of the worst, because they aren’t very clear, but it’s something to do that isn’t homework.

When in doubt for a time killer, look to bike.

When you wake up from nightmares about people leaving you and your mom without a word just like your dad, look to bike.

When all you can think about is how some of the closest people in your life are something not human, look to bike.

So, when Orion rolls back into town, Jack is awake and working by bare and dim sunlight from the open garage door.

The notable thing about it though, because Orion always keeps odd hours, is that, through the windows of the cab, Jack can see him talking to someone.

Someone he’s never seen before.

A man in a suit wearing a scowl like it’s going out of style.

And it becomes even more notable when Orion stops in front of his house.

Weird.

Weird weird weird.

It’s like if Blake started making house calls.

Talking to Orion was something you did while you were both on the move, going from the same point A to separate point Bs.

Not in the garage of his house.

It’s kind of a shame he picked today of all days too.

Because today Jack’s mom is on the night shift filling in and that means she’s not home.

Not for another hour or two at least.

Orion steps out slower than the other man does, carefully, probably so his shadow and edges have time to line up. 

He takes off his weird-cool headphones and his bandana almost immediately when he looks up and catches Jack's eye, laughter lines crinkling.

It feels kinda sorta like some weird show of trust.

Everything about them is weird.

It’s starting to not sound like a real word anymore.

“Hello, Jack.” Orion says at the seam where driveway blends into garage, the rumble of his tenor traveling in a way that he’s somehow gotten used to. “Are we interrupting?”

“Hey, Orion.” Jack says tiredly back. “And um, no. I’m just reading Blake’s instructions. Mom isn’t home yet, if that’s who you’re looking for. She had night shift today.”

The other man steps up to Orion, and he distantly notes that there’s nothing wrong with his shadow.

His edges are clear.

There’s nothing about him that’s off.

Yet.

He could be normal.

He could be human.

But better safe than sorry.

Orion smiles, and the man stares for a second like he can’t believe what he’s seeing.

Which is strange.

Orion smiles all the time.

Maybe it’s that Orion took off his bandana so there’s more to see than just the creases around his eyes.

“We would also like to speak to June, but for now, you are the primary concern.” Orion tells him gently.

“Okay…” He puts his wrench down slowly. He doesn't like the sound of that. “What’s wrong?”

Orion’s face goes soft as Jack tenses, dropping to a knee to be more level.

Even when he’s sitting down and Orion is on a knee he’s still taller.

He’s a giant.

A giant.

“Nothing is wrong,” Orion assures him softly, and it probably says something about Jack that the way his voice carries way too far and deeply is reassuring.

But it’s familiar.

Orion is familiar.

He won’t let anything happen.

Not with this probably human that he doesn’t know.

This probably human that doesn't exactly set him on edge, but definitely doesn't reassure him either.

Because even Blake and Doctor Aston have rules.

Have things they fit into.

They’re on the opposite side of whatever Orion and R.C. are, it would be hard to miss that at this point, miss that and all their little comments, but they’ve never hurt Jack.

Doctor Aston likes to talk big, to make thin threats, but Blake never lets him get very far.

Jack just thinks he’s miffed for saying he wasn’t scared of him.

Humans though?

Humans don’t make sense.

They whisper and they talk and they gossip and it’s–

Cruelty for the sake of cruelty.

Which sounded harsh, but they still–

They still talked about him and his mom and his friends just because they could.

Just because it was different.

And Jack hated that.

He didn't hate that his dad left, even though it stung.

His mom and his dad, they weren't happy, not at the end.

But maybe he would've liked more contact than child service checks.

Maybe he would've liked to know him.

It was what it was, though.

His dad was gone.

His mom was happier.

They were on their own for a while, and then Orion and R.C. stepped into their world.

And the rumors started flying, started digging into their skin.

It had been that way for what felt like a long time now.

Maybe it wasn’t fair.

But a lot of things weren’t fair.

Jack was used to it.

He had to be.

“Promise?”

Orion nods with a dip of his head.

“I promise you.”

Orion wouldn’t lie.

Jack wasn’t sure he knew how.

Just like how R.C. didn't know her hair should fade and Blake hadn't known human eyes shouldn't be gold.

“Okay.” Jack pauses and then looks to the new man. “Who’s that?”

Orion twists to look too, and gestures with one hand.

“This is Agent Fowler. He was…” Orion pauses for a long moment, and then continues with a careful, “Concerned about your and your mother’s involvement in our affairs.”

Jack blinks, confused.

“We haven’t done anything.”

Orion isn’t smiling anymore, and simply nods his head.

“I believe his worries stem from possible consequences of association, Jack. Not anything you have personally done.”

He frowns.

“We’re fine.”

“For now,” Agent Fowler finally speaks up. “But you may not be in the future.”

His voice is normal.

No long carry or vibration through the earth.

He’s human.

Human.

It's not as reassuring as it should be.

“If someone was going to hurt me, they would’ve by now.” Jack tells him frankly. “I’m fine.”

“Things change,” Agent Fowler says, “Do you understand what it is you’re falling into? What you and your mother are falling into?”

He grits his teeth.

This sounds far too much like an attempt at bullying him away from the others for comfort.

He won't have it.

“I have a pretty good idea.” Jack says evenly. “Jasper’s a small town, Agent Fowler. There’s rumors about the bases, and about the sixties. And I’m not blind. I can tell when someone glitches out of existence. Sir.”

If Orion is surprised, it doesn’t show.

His face is a carefully calm mask.

Fowler, though, is.

“You saw what–”

“It was a long time ago,” Jack continues like Fowler never said anything. “But I know what I saw. So, with all due respect, I know exactly what I’m doing. And I’m not going anywhere.”

Fowler makes the face his mom does when she says she’s getting a headache at that.

He doesn’t say anything for a long moment.

And then he grimaces and sighs.

“Pr– Orion.”

Orion tilts his head.

“I won’t report this,” Fowler says lowly, hands curling into fists so tight his knuckles go pale. “I should, but I’m not going to. I know better. If I tell him not to, he’s just going to anyway. So you make sure he can defend himself. You make sure he doesn’t end up road kill or dead in a ditch, you hear me? Or I’m pulling the full weight of my authority down on your head. Is that understood?”

Orion gives him a smile that looks achingly tired.

Like the responsibility of someone's life isn't something new.

“I understand, Agent Fowler. Thank you for this show of trust.”

Fowler scowls and looks away.

“Don’t make me regret it.”

Jack doesn’t know a lot of what they’re talking about.

He doesn’t know the details or the grit or the context.

He should be scared, probably.

Scared at the intensity of Fowler and his words.

Scared of how Orion looks so very old in that moment.

But R.C. makes his mom happy.

Orion is his friend.

Blake and Doctor Aston are some strange limbo, because he doesn’t know why Blake cares and doesn’t think Doctor Aston cares beyond that Blake does.

But he doesn’t think they would hurt him.

Not really.

Maybe he doesn’t know them as well as he thinks he does, doesn’t even know what they are, but he doesn’t think they would hurt him.

If they wanted to, they could’ve by now.

He’s been alone with them in the shop plenty of times.

But it’s never happened.

Blake even made a guide for him, with sketches, of how to fix his bike on his own, just so that he wouldn’t have to keep paying him his allowance. 

Maybe they aren’t good.

But they have been kind.

Kind like Orion and R.C.

And kindness from them is more than he can say he gets from humans.

Even if it’s all said behind his back, or from across the street.

“Do you wanna come in and wait until my mom get’s home?"

Orion gives him that tired smile.

It aches in a way that feels like the weight of the whole world.

“That would be very kind of you, Jack.”

He smiles back, and hopes it helps to lever off some of the strain.

“No problem.”

Fowler ends up talking with his mom for a long time before Orion takes him back to wherever it was he came from.

He promises to check in every six months, but that he was going to stay out of their business as much he could.

Plausible deniability that way, if he didn’t know anything.

It made sense.

But Orion called him agent.

And Jack wondered what he was an agent for.

Jack is thirteen years old when R.C. takes him to the big house on the edge of the neighborhood.

He’s never seen it before.

Not in person.

He’s only heard about it in rumors.

The garage is, in fact, massive.

Almost like a barn, really, just made of metal.

Maybe one of those military base things that’s like a sideways cylinder half sunk into the ground.

He can see Orion’s semi through the cracked doors, and a shadow of something else, but he doesn’t need to see it to know Orion is home.

He’s waiting for them at the door.

And so is the man in the lab coat.

The muscle car isn’t in the driveway when they pull up, and neither is Cliff's bright red Dodge or the green off roader.

He can kind of see what looks like the white and orange ambulance though, as they get closer and the angle changes, through the sliver of what he can see into the garage.

“So this is him,” the lab coat man says when Jack hops off of R.C.’s bike.

His hair is kind of orange, and the closer he gets the more he can see the freckles on his face and arms.

The more he can see how twisted the scars on his hands and arms are.

Probably from sticking his hands into busted up vehicles to do repairs for years.

There’s creases on his face that look like they’re from frowning, as opposed to Orion’s laughter lines.

He’s shorter too.

They look kind of like opposites.

But.

Good opposites.

Like Blake and Doctor Aston.

Orion smiles, a soft sort of thing.

“This is him.” He tells the lab coat man. “Jack, this is our mechanic–”

“You can call me Ratchet.” The lab coat man interrupts.

And that pulls Jack up short.

Because.

He’s not even trying?

“Ratchet?” He asks carefully.

“If your name was something like Rasputin,” Ratchet says with contempt, “Wouldn’t you go by Ratchet?”

He considers that.

It seems plausible enough.

And Orion said he was a mechanic so–

It fits, right?

“That's fair.”

“Fantastic,” Ratchet says with a sarcastic throw of his hands. “Glad we’re all on the same page.”

He wears a lab coat, but, again, Orion called him a mechanic.

He remembers the night he met R.C. pretty well for all that he was, you know, nine and half way to sleep for part of it.

And he remembers her mentioning a ‘Doc’ that was going to kill her when he saw her bike.

Orion had said he would talk to him, probably to smooth it over.

Jack thinks for a minute.

He’s smart.

He can put pieces together.

And he asks, “Are you a doctor like Doctor Aston's a doctor?”

Ratchet blinks.

It looks kind of like he's rebooting.

“I beg your pardon.”

“Doctor Aston works on cars,” Jack says slowly. “Not people. Orion called you a mechanic, and R.C. called you doc, once.”

Ratchet goes through a rapid series of facial expressions.

“Aston?” He asks in a measured tone.

Jack steps a little closer to R.C. before answering.

“Doctor K. O. Aston. Him and Blake run Kaon Repairs. He calls himself a doctor, but he only works on cars. Which is why I asked if you were a doctor like he’s a doctor.” 

Ratchet flickers through expressions even faster, but Jack doesn’t think he’s glitching.

Processing emotions too fast for any human, maybe.

But not glitching.

“You– you know them?” He asks after a long moment.

His voice is pitched with disbelief.

Jack shrugs and R.C. puts a hand on his shoulder.

“Kind of. Doctor Aston is hung up about me not being scared of him, but Blake seems to like me. He fixes my bike.”

Ratchet’s face finally goes towards something approaching calm, but neutral might be more accurate.

Then he turns to Orion to furiously hiss, “He associates with–”

“We have no quarrel with them Ratchet,” Orion interrupts evenly. “They have done nothing wrong. They are living their lives, the same as we are. And it is highly likely that Jasper is the first peace they have had in a long time. I will not be the one to ruin it for them.”

It sounds like an old argument.

Ratchet purses his lips.

Jack feels kind of like this is a conversation he shouldn’t be hearing, but also like it’s not going to stop anytime soon.

Jack said he wasn’t leaving.

Now he has to make good on his promise.

“And what if they change their mind? What if they hurt someone?”

“We have caused our fair share of grief, old friend,” Orion says softly. “Let them have their peace and comforts while they last. We will deal with the consequences of our actions if and when they arise.”

R.C. squeezes his shoulder, then.

“The old men are talking,” she whispers. “Let’s go do something fun and come back in half an hour, yeah?”

Jack doesn’t really think about it before nodding, because riding R.C.'s bike is the coolest thing, but when he turns back, he’s missed what it was Orion said when he wasn’t listening.

Ratchet sighs and crosses his arms as R.C. leads him back down the driveway.

“We’ll just have to see, then, now won’t we?” He hears him say.

Jack can’t help one more look back as R.C. hands him his helmet.

Orion looks a million miles away, standing on that porch.

Jack barely catches it when he solemnly says, “And we shall reap the hurricane when it comes.”

Knowing self defense, in the end, really just entails how to be really good at running and really good at hitting pulse points.

Hit hard and fast and run like your life depends on it.

The things they’re fighting, Orion and Ratchet and R.C., it’s so far out of his league it isn’t even funny.

Jack knows what it means, being taught how to evade and hide and dig his fingers into weak spots.

It means that whatever it is he’s supposed to be running from, it’s stronger than him.

It’s bigger than him, more powerful than him.

It’s something he can’t fight.

It’s something with voices that travel and grumbles like car engines.

It’s Blake and Doctor Aston.

It’s his friends.

And it is fighting.

You don’t get your throat torn up on accident.

You don’t get a scar so close to your eye it’s almost taken out on accident.

You don’t get singed, dented, damaged vehicles just driving on the open road.

Blake was used to people being afraid of him and Doctor Aston.

It all fit together like puzzle pieces, even if he didn’t know exactly what the picture was.

It was bigger than him though.

So much bigger and greater and more than one human.

He was caught in the middle.

And he wasn’t moving.

In a desert town like Jasper, you notice when there’s clouds and shadows.

You notice when there’s helicopters and planes flying above you, so far and high they look like strange birds instead of what they are, and you notice the normal vultures and scavengers too.

But the quiet planes are quiet for a reason.

So that you don't know they're there.

And Jack wouldn’t know any different if R.C. hadn’t started pointing them out.

All the buzzards and blobs.

He starts paying attention after that.

He starts looking up.

Ratchet seems to take a lot of things personally.

Just in general.

And he seems to take Jack getting repairs and advice from Blake as a personal offense to his everything.

Which, after another good old fashion session of Climb This and Hide in That and Run Until I Catch You with R.C., is what leads to Ratchet sitting him down in front of a broken car that he says they’re going to put back together, as a team, on pain of death.

Orion quietly tells him when Ratchet isn’t looking that it’s his way of trying to bond.

It doesn’t really feel that way when Jack has no idea what he’s looking at and keeps nicking himself on sharp metal.

“Shouldn’t we be looking at books or something first?” He asks Ratchet as another sharp spike digs into his arm.

God.

What happened to this car.

It’s kind of a nightmare.

Jack can hear Ratchet laugh from above him where he’s looking under the hood.

“I believe,” he says sardonically, “in learning on the job.”

“Do you?” Jack asks skeptically. “Do you really? Because this feels kind of like you poking at me for having friends, just like the rest of the town does.”

There’s a pause, and he finally pulls his arm out of the hole in the undercarriage.

The hole.

And you know what was in the hole?

Jack doesn’t.

It looks almost like a bullet, though, except bigger.

It was stuck pretty far in, too, kind of like the car had been pushed onto its side and used like a shield.

“That was not my intention.” Ratchet finally says, something about his voice very, very different now. “To make you feel as though you were being judged yet again in a space that is supposed to be safe.”

Jack pauses before sending the maybe-bullet in a roll out from under the car.

“It’s okay. You’re apologizing now.” He decides.

“Is it?” Ratchet asks him skeptically.

Jack stops again.

“I dunno. People don’t really apologise to me.” He tells the undercarriage of the car. “They kinda just talk behind my back and then act scandalized when I don’t pretend that I can’t hear them.”

The garage is silent for a moment.

“That is cruel.” Ratchet says then, something– maybe wounded in his tone.

Like an old hurt rearing its head.

Jack bobs his head even though no one can see it.

“I know.” He says evenly. “But I’m used to it.”
Ratchet makes a noise somewhere between a scoff and a snort, but doesn’t say anything else.

Jack pushes himself a little bit further under the car and finds another hole.

Hurray.

More mysterious maybe-bullets for Jack.

“I used to be a field medic.” Ratchet suddenly says, and Jack pauses to focus on his voice, hand hovering inches from the pit in the undercarriage.

“Yeah?”

He doesn’t ask in what war.

“For a long time,” Ratchet continues. “You could say eons, even. I was good at my job. Maybe too good. I brought people back from the brink. I salvaged what no one else could. I treated everyone fairly, regardless of their side. I was a medic first, and a combatant second.”

Eons.

Jack doesn’t say anything, and Ratchet keeps talking.

“People defected to either side all the time. It was hard to feel like you were winning when everyone was dying. No one really wins in a war. But it was harder to gain allies, to treat new patients, when the other side spread rumors about exactly what kind of doctor you were.”

“Like a scare tactic?” Jack asks curiously.

Ratchet grunts.

“Exactly. Make your troops too scared of the other side and they’ll never defect.”

“But people did anyway,” Jack guesses.

“Of course they did.” Ratchet says like he’s an idiot, but he’s figured out at this point that that’s kind of just how he talks. “They were more willing to chance rumors than stay with their previous faction. We treated prisoners and defectors well enough, and it was hard to argue with results. Everyone wants to be a winner in a war. We even had a spymaster defect to our side, though his circumstances were a bit… strange.”

Jack doesn’t really know what to say to that.

“People were still scared, though, of being treated.” Ratchet continues in a softer voice. “Because of the things that the CMOs and SICs spread about myself and the other medics. It was… painful, almost, to have someone think you would go against your oath and rip them to pieces for parts while they were still– alive.”

For parts.

Parts.

“That sounds really awful, Ratchet.” Jack whispers.

There’s a slam as the hood is pushed shut.

“It was, Jack,” is all Ratchet says for a long time.

He pulls out a second maybe-bullet, and rolls it across the floor.

“That’s enough for today, I think.” Ratchet mumbles above him, and Jack pushes himself out from underneath the car.

His hands are covered in soot and dirt and grease.

Ratchet grimaces at the sight of him.

“Wash up,” he orders, his usual bite starting to edge back into his tone. “Then we’ll see about those cuts.”

Jack gives him a thumbs up and a small smile.

“Sure thing, Doc.”

Ratchet snorts derisively at that.

“Don’t call me Doc.”  

But Jack can see him almost smiling as he turns away.

Agent Fowler is a weird guy.

He likes to pretend he doesn’t care or have feelings about things.

Ratchet does the same thing by acting like he’s always angry or irritated.

They would probably get along if they both weren’t so prickly.

He gets along with his mom well enough, though.

Jack’s kind of glad, if a little weary.

His mom needs more friends.

She doesn’t have a lot of them anymore.

He’s not sure she ever really did.

Not here, at least.

Not in Jasper.

“You smell like engine grease, squishy.” Doctor Aston greets him when he walks through the door.

“Hi, Doctor Aston. How am I? Great, thanks for asking.” Jack responds sarcastically. “How are you?”

The man sticks out his tongue.

It’s very mature.

“I was doing wonderfully, before you waltzed in here.” He says before turning around, pushing aside the curtain that divides the room from the rest of the building, and yelling, “Blake, your pet is here!”

There’s a moment of silence and then, “He ain’t my pet! Stop sayin’ that!”

“Well then what is he?” Doctor Aston asks expectantly.

There’s another pause.

“An associate?” Is the unsure response. “I’ll be out in five!”

Doctor Aston smiles wanly.

“Primus help us all.” He mutters.

“Do you have to do this every time I come here?” Jack asks tiredly.

Doctor Aston’s expression changes to a smirk in a blink.

“But of course!” He says brightly, even though the corners of his mouth are already beginning to turn down. “One day I’ll get an answer out of him.”

Jack tilts his head at that.

Hmm.

“I don’t think he actually knows.”
“See, I think he does,” Doctor Aston says with a frown. “I’m just trying to get him to admit it.”

Jack…

Doesn’t really know what to say to that.

So he settles for, “Why?”

Doctor Aston looks uncomfortably serious when he glances back at Jack.

His eyes are red.

Red red red.

“You’re a smart squishy,” he says swiftly, and it almost doesn’t sound condescending. “I’m sure you can understand what happens to people that associate with the enemy peacefully.”

Associate with the enemy.

The enemy.

Jack purses his lips.

“They’re traitors.” He says with uncertainty.

“That’s right,” Doctor Aston croons with mock praise. “They’re traitors. And our side? Is not nearly so forgiving as your fearless red and blue leader.”

Jack curls his hands into fists, nails digging into his palms.

Ratchet’s words ring in his ears.

They ring and ring and ring.

“Do you have to be on that side?” He asks softly, and part of him is proud of his voice for not cracking.

Doctor Aston looks startled for a moment, and then tired in a drawn, thin way.

Kind of almost like he wants to laugh.

“We’ve been at this a long time, human.” He whispers gravely as Blake’s footsteps finally come into range. “And it’s long past the age of redemption.”

Jack clenches his jaw.

“I don’t believe that.”

Doctor Aston’s eyes are that bloody, glowing red.

His face completely blank.

Wiped clean of anything at all.

“Then, Jackson Darby, you are a fool.”

“Why are you guys fighting, Orion?”

There’s a pause.

Orion doesn’t look up from his tablet for a long moment.

“I ask myself that more often than you can know,” he says to the plexiglass of the screen. “But it started due to many things. With a revolution, and tentative peace that broke way to a new age. But it did not last.”

Jack puts his arms around his knees.

“What happened?”

Orion doesn’t grimace.

He doesn’t frown or scowl.

He just sighs.

Heavy with the weight of whatever it is that’s happened to him.

“Some though social reform was not moving fast enough. Some thought it was moving too fast. The rapidly growing rights of the people versus the fragile peace state of the world. Both sides were right.” Orion says tiredly. “The people needed to be protected, but should fighting break out once more… We would be back at a war on a global scale.”

Jack digs his fingers into his knees.

A global scale.

“It happened anyway, though.”

“Yes.” Orion intones softly. “It happened anyway. Sides were chosen. Tension grew. The peace became more and more fragile, until it finally reached a head, and war broke out. Over time, the true purpose was lost. It was no longer what we fought for.”

Jack doesn’t really know how to feel.

That sounds… really awful.

Really, really awful.

He doesn’t even really know what Orion is talking about, doesn’t even really understand what it is he’s lost, but it still… it still hurts.

He aches for them.

He really does.

It’s all so bad.

“I’m really sorry, Orion.” He whispers, and it sounds weak even to his own ears.

How do you apologise for something that you don’t understand?

“Do not be, Jack.” Orion says, almost horribly gentle. “For we were the architects of our own doomsday and unmaking.”

Everything is awful and complicated.

He doesn’t like it.

Everyone just sounds so sad and tired and defeated.

And it’s all tangled up.

It’s all messy.

Jack doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do.

How he’s supposed to fix it.

He doesn’t think he can.

“What are you going to do, Blake?”

There’s a hum.

“About what?”

Jack leans onto his elbows.

“About this.” He answers. “The shop and the cars and me.”

Blake finally looks up from the car engine he’s tugging on.

Humans aren’t able to lug around car engines, but Blake doesn’t know that, and no one else is here, so Jack doesn’t really think he needs to tell him.

Or, well, maybe he does know, and he just doesn’t think he needs to hide around Jack.

If that’s it, maybe it’s some sort of show of trust.

Kind of like how Orion always keeps his bandana up unless he’s talking to someone he knows.

“Whadda ya mean?” Blake asks confusedly.

Jack frowns and tries to find the words.

“This isn’t… it can’t keep. You’re all waiting for something, right?” He swings his legs over the edge of the car he’s sitting on. “That’s why you always have the radio on static. To keep the channel open. What’re you gonna do when it gets here? Doctor Aston said that you guys, being in the same space as the others and not fighting, that it was treasonous. And that things didn’t go well for traitors.”

Blake frowns too, and looks away.

“K.O. talks a lot. Doesn’t always know what he’s saying.”

“He sounded pretty sure to me,” Jack mumbles.

Blake doesn’t say anything.

“And he said that it was too late for redemption.”

Blake doesn’t say anything.

“And that I was a fool for thinking otherwise.”

Blake doesn’t say anything.

“But like… I wanna know what you think.”

There’s still that silence.

Jack lays down across the hood.

He’s not sure what he wants Blake to say.

If he actually wants him to respond or not.

Everything is complicated.

Everything is so complicated.

“I’ve been taking orders for a long time,” Blake's voice finally says, careful and even. “And on both sides. I’ve seen what it’s like. And I’ve seen what this planet is like. In the grand scheme of things and stuff, years aren’t a lot of time. Not for me at least. But these past few years of peace’ve been… I dunno. Nice. Didn’t take orders from no one. Didn’t fight for my life. Just lived. Had a job. Made a living. Got to drive whenever I want, do whatever I want. Always new movies, new folks. It ain’t a bad place.”

This planet.

Jack doesn’t breathe.

“So what’re you gonna do?” He repeats in a croak.

Blake is silent again, for another long moment.

“I dunno. We’ll wait an’ see, I guess.” is his answer.

Then there’s a clang of– he’s guessing– the engine being dropped, and Jack jumps, which is a bad thing to do when you’re laying down on the hood of a car, and he almost slides all the way off before big hands grab him by the armpits and lift him up.

“You’re thinkin’ too much,” Blake tells him seriously. “But you got spark, kid. You’re good. Better ‘an some’a the people I know, and trust me, I know a lot of people. But you can’t go worrying about what if’s. Things change. You gotta adapt.”

Jack swings kind of limply from his grip before Blake sets him back down.

“You said you fought for both sides.” He says quietly. “Why’d you change?”

Blake cocks his head to the side.

“For K.O.” He answers easily. “He mattered most.”

He blinks.

And… 

That… that made sense.

Blake's flavour of loyalty seems to be the kind rooted more in people than a cause.

He squints at Jack for a long moment, leaning in real close.

He makes a face at him.

“Still thinkin’ too hard,” Blake diagnoses dully before turning around. “C’mon. Let's go look at that engine block. I want you to tell me what the parts are.”

Jack frowns at his retreating back.

“I’m not very good at remembering that stuff,” he warns him.

Blake casts a look at him over his shoulder.

He looks confused.

“You don’t have to be good at it,” he says easily. “Not on this planet. You just have to try.”

Jack is fourteen years old when he ‘starts’ highschool.

He has a summer birthday, so he’s always a year younger.

He also says ‘starts’ because Jasper has middle and highschool in the same building, so it’s not like he’s really going anywhere.

It’s pretty much the same as middle school.

People talk about him behind his back, people pretend to not be talking about him behind his back, the teachers look at him with a mild pity but never do anything about it, and Vince bothers him after the final bell just like he has for, give or take a few months, eight years now.

It’s Jasper.

Nothing really exciting happens.

Nothing beyond car accidents and decades old rumors of water running blue.

Somewhere between ten and thirteen, Jack got used to inhumanity.

To shadows that fell wrong and voices that traveled too far.

To eyes that flashed in the dark and bodies that flickered out of reality.

To Orion and Blake and R.C. and Doctor Aston.

He got used to it.

Like exposure therapy.

Jack got used to it.

And now when he listens to his teachers at school, to the whispers around his ears, they all… 

They all ring hollow.

There’s no depth.

No carry.

No travel through his bones.

And somehow, something about that–

It's managed to become alien.

“D’you know when I’m gonna meet the others, Ratchet?”

There’s a grunt, and then Ratchet rolls out from under the car, holding what Jack thinks is a muffler.

“Others?” He asks dully, scowling at the maybe-muffler in his hands. “This is a terrible make. Who made this?”

Jack waves a hand to get his attention again. 

“Others like B and the green off roader. I don’t know him or his name.” He explains quickly. “I’ve seen Cliff around a few times, but he doesn’t count, and I’ve seen B’s car, but we’ve never, you know, interacted or anything.”

Ratchet squints.

“Really?”

Jack makes a wave motion with his whole arm.

“Like ships passing in the night.”

Ratchet squints harder.

“Huh.” He stands up from the creeper, tossing the probably-muffler from hand to hand. “Strange. The off roader is Bruce. They’re both friendly enough, so I can’t see why you keep missing them. Think fast.”

He only has a second to register the command before Ratchet picks something up off of his work bench and throws it at him.

He fumbles the catch and has to grab it a second time to keep it from hitting the floor.

It’s a rectangle, kind of like one of Orion’s tablets, just… smaller.

Hand sized.

With rubber casing on one side and plexi-glass on the other.

“What is it?” He asks, pressing one of the buttons on the side experimentally.

It lights up with an icon he’s never seen anywhere in his life.

Never seen anywhere except for the grill of Orion’s truck and on the side plating of R.C.’s bike.

It spins around lazily like a coin before filling the whole screen with red, and then fading to blue.

It reads the time and the date and the weather and–

A message pops up at the top of the screen.

It says comms request: yes/no?

Jack hesitates for only a second and clicks yes.

Another notification pops up at the top of the screen, and when he experimentally taps on it, it takes him to a completely different screen.

At the top it reads Ratchet and then at the very bottom there’s one message.

Consider it a late birthday present.

He looks up fast enough to give himself whiplash.

But Ratchet is already gone.

“This is B.” Orion introduces softly. “B, this is Jack.”

The muscle car driver waves enthusiastically, which he hesitantly returns, and then spells something out to Orion in a practiced hand.

Jack doesn’t know sign, so he doesn’t know what it was B said.

Yet.

He doesn’t know sign yet.

Orion seems to consider whatever it is before signing something back.

B beams with all his teeth.

And then the radio on the muscle car plays a sound clip proclaiming, “This is going to be so much fun!”

Jack tenses and inches closer to Orion.

“What did you say?” He asks wearily.

Orion smiles at him.

“I gave him clearance to take you off road.” He explains, and there’s definitely amusement in his tone. “On the condition that he has already checked with Ratchet.”

Jack blinks, turns the proposition over in his head, and squints.

“Like how R.C. does, sometimes?”

B does a fist pump, and Orion’s smile grows.

“Exactly.”

The radio spits out a burst of static before yelling, “WOAH-OH WE’RE HALFWAY THERE! WOAH OH, LIVIN’ ON A PRAYER!”

Jack laughs at that, just a little.

“He’s not even trying to hide it, is he?” He asks bemusedly.

Orion’s smile turns wry.

He doesn't ask what it is.

They all know better.

“At times, subtly is not his strong suit, no.” He gives a fond sort of sigh. “I cannot begrudge him his radio, though. It is all the voice he has left.”

Jack swallows reflexively, almost reaching up to touch his own neck.

“Yeah. I don’t think I could either.” He crosses his arms to stop himself. “Who’s idea was it?”
The grin turns soft.

“Ratchet.”

Jack thinks he understands why Orion always has his bandana over his face now.

His smiles give him away.

“Sounds about right.”

“Hey! What do you think you’re doing?!”

And speak of the devil.

B shrinks back against the car, and Ratchet looms over him.

“What did I tell you?” He grinds out, and B almost melts into the door he’s leaning on.

The radio is silent, for a moment, and then there’s a playback of Ratchet’s voice saying, “And no off roading!”

Ratchet looms even more, and Jack takes a half step behind Orion, trying not to snicker.

“And what did you try to do?”

B looks anywhere but Ratchet, miserably signing something out with his hands.

Probably a reluctant Off roading.

“Is he always like this?” Jack asks Orion quietly.

Orion glances back at him over his shoulder.

“Not always, but often, yes.” He answers just as softly. “However, Ratchet tends to hold the greatest amount of worry for B’s injuries. He is afraid of failure.”

Jack frowns.

“Am I allowed to ask why?”

Orion glances back over him again, and for a moment he looks… old.

Weighed down.

Tired.

Eons, even, says Ratchet’s voice.

It’s long past the age of redemption, says Doctor Aston’s voice.

I’ve been taking orders for a long time, says Blake’s voice.

In the sixties, Jasper ran electric blue.

“B’s voice was damaged in combat.” Orion tells him so softly he can barely hear it. “Ratchet was not able to save it. Him, yes. But his voice was damaged beyond repair. He has never forgiven himself.”

Jack looks at the two of them from behind Orion’s back.

Ratchet is still glowering, but B’s risen away from the car door, signing frantically with his hands.

And the scars on his throat ripple like sunlight in water.

“I’m thinking about getting a job.”

R.C. hums absently.

“It’ll be good to have some extra spending money, just in case.” He continues. “And I might be able to buy some of the groceries, you know?”

R.C. hums again.

“Start saving for college and all that– do you know what college is?”

Another hum.

“Cool. Also, I’m thinking about leaving Jasper to become a professional stuntman.”

Hum–

“Wait what.”

There it is.

R.C. looks at him with wide eyes, startled, maybe even apprehensive, and then she seems to process the fact that he’s trying not to laugh, and her face morphs into something amused.

“That was a joke, wasn’t it?”

Jack nods from where he’s laying on the couch.

“To see if you were paying attention, yeah.”

R.C. looks at least a little apologetic.
“Sorry Jack,” she says, pushing her chair back before swinging around to sit in it backwards, facing him. “Go ahead. You now have my undivided attention.”

He tilts his head, and considers for a moment.

Might as well not dodge around it, right?

Don’t beat around the bush and all that.

“You like my mom, right R.C.?”

She frowns.

“Of course I do, Jack.” She says, voice tinged with confusion. “June is a wonderful person. She’s a good friend.”

Jack scrunches up his face.

“No, I mean you like- like her, right?”

“I– what? What does like-like mean? Is one like… not enough?”

Jack groans.

“No, like–” He sits up to brace both hands on the back of the couch and stare R.C. in the face. “I’m asking if you're in love with my mom, R.C.”

Her face goes completely blank like a computer crash.

And then she flickers, face going from pink to red in seconds.

“I– I don’t know what you’re– what?” She stammers out.

Jack tries not to laugh.

Or smile.

Or anything like that.

He mostly succeeds.

“I– I have no idea what you’re– Jack!” 

Nope.

Critical failure.

He starts laughing.

Just a little.

“It’s– it’s not funny!” R.C. yells between protests.

He snorts.

“I’m not– You went so red– it’s not a big deal, R.C.” Jack chokes out between laughter. “I just want to know. You make her really happy.”

R.C. goes even more red, all the way up to her ears.

“I– I make her really happy?” She whispers, voice choked.

Jack raises an eyebrow.

It feels like a very Ratchet eyebrow raise.

“She smiles more when you’re around.” He starts, and R.C.’s face does something complicated. “Mom was upset a lot before you started dropping by and staying until dinner. She talks about you to Agent Fowler over the phone pretty much all the time. They’re like, best friends now. I don’t know how it happened. But she talks to him about you constantly. Do you need some water? You look really red.”

R.C. abruptly stands up.

“Do you know where June is? Right now?” She asks in a strangled sort of voice.

Jack props his head up on his hand.

“Backyard. She has some flowers she waters before and after work.” He looks down the hallway. “If you go now, you can probably catch her before she really starts working on dinner.”

R.C. gives him a jerky nod and then marches down the hallway.

She flickers twice before disappearing around the bend, and then Jack can hear the sound of the back door opening.

There’s a chime from his phone to the sound of the lock.

BH: Did she do it?

Bee: Did she did she did she???

Cliff: Tell uuuuus c’mon jack spiiiiilllll

Ratchet: WHY ARE YOU ALL ON THE COMMS NETWORK INSTEAD OF FOCUSING ON PATROL?

Jack snorts into his hand and almost chokes.

Bee: BUSTED

Cliff: Moral support, doc

BH: Uuuuuuhhhhh what he said

Orion: Moral support?

Bee: YEAH

Cliff: Cee’s finally goin’ for it

Orion: It?

He wheezes past the worst of it and types out a message before anyone else can.

Jack: Asking out my mom 

Orion: Ah. I wish her luck.

Cliff: YEEEAAAHHH THE BIG MAN IS ROOTING FOR IT!

Ratchet: Yes yes, we can all fawn LATER now get BACK TO YOUR PATROLS

Bee: Boooooooo. Where’s your sense of romance, Ratchet?

Ratchet: With my patience.

Bee: But that doesn’t

Bee: Ah

Bee: It was a joke. I get it.

Bee: WAIT IT WAS A JOKE

Bee: RATCHET I’M SO PROUD OF YOU!!!!!

Cliff: HE HAS A SENSE OF HUMOR AFTER ALL!!

Ratchet: Primus take me now

Jack is still laughing when he sees R.C. tentatively holding his mom’s hand in the hallway.

He quickly tells them that he has some homework he needs to finish up and almost sprints out of the room still snickering.

Dinner won’t take more than half an hour, and then R.C. will leave.

Still, though.

It’s a half an hour he can give them.

“Tell me what this is.”

“Suspension?”

Blake squints at him long enough to make Jake feel like he's gotten it wrong before clapping him on the shoulder with a smile.

“Mhmm. Suspension.” Then he points over Jack’s shoulder and through the window. “You see that engine there? Go find me a spark plug.”

Jack gives a mock salute as he turns, stepping out of the way of the shadow at the door.

“This feels like you’re just using me as a courier,” he says dryly as the door opens.

Blake grins wider.

“Maybe I am. Go find me a spark plug, human child.” 

Jack turns to the person in the door so he can step around–

It’s–

It’s Sierra from school.

He frowns as she startles, almost violently so.

“What are you doing here?” She asks.

Why wouldn’t he be here?

Jack frowns more.

“Currently? Getting a spark plug. Do you need something?”

She glances between him and Blake.

Why is she nervous?

He squints at Blake, but he can’t see anything out of place.

“Uh, yeah.” She finally says. “Our car– me and my parents– something’s wrong with it. I biked here.”

Blake stands up straighter at that.

“How wrong?” He rumbles.

Sierra shrugs helplessly.

“Won’t start. There’s no smoke, or anything. It just… won’t start.”

Blake frowns, considering.

“What’ve you got after this Jack?” He asks suddenly. “Homework or one-on-one with white, orange, and grumpy?”

He thinks for a moment, and then checks his phone.

“Uh, the second, I think. Just theory today though.”

Blake grunts.

“What kind of theory?”

Jack shrugs before walking closer to the counter and holding up the message.

“I’m not sure. He just said theory.”

Blake squints at the screen and then seems to visibly weigh the options for a moment.

“Eh, it’s fine.” He decides. “You’ll come with me. We’re fixing a car.”

“Ratchet’ll be mad if I miss anything.” He warns.

Blake makes a pssh noise.

“Relax. I’ll drop you off after. Doc’s all about the pursuit of knowledge and blah blah blah.” He says easily. “This’ll just be theory put into practice. It’s fine.”

And then he–

Ruffles Jack’s hair.

“You worry too much.”

He tries not to laugh as something… warm floods through him.

“Who taught you that?” He asks with a grin.

Blake grins back. 

“Movie.” Then he taps at the casing of Jack’s phone. “Go on. Tell the old man you’ll be a little late. It’ll really grind his gears that you’re fixing a car with me.”

Jack squints as he types out the message.

“Is this about learning on the job or about you making Ratchet mad?”

Blake shrugs.

“Can’t it be both?”

And then Sierra jumps, like she just realized something, and Jack’s focus snaps back to her.

He’d– forgotten, for a moment, that she was there.

It was easy to forget about other people when talking to one of the others.

They were so much.

Humans didn’t always register.

“Him too?” She asks hesitantly. "Do you really think something's that wrong?"

Blake waves a hand.

“Kid’s good for handing me tools if nothing else. Smaller ‘an me too.” He explains with a shrug, picking up something that rattles from behind the counter. “If it is that bad we’ll tow it back, if not? We’ll just fix it then and there. Hold this.”

And then Blake drops a toolbox into his arms.

He almost fumbles the catch.

Almost.

Then there’s the sound of more rattling before Blake drops out of view behind the counter entirely.

Sierra looks… out of place, in the repair shop.

Nervous and tense and glancing at everything like it’s going to come alive and bite her.

“Why are you so nervous?” He whispers, and she jumps again. “It’s just a room. Completely normal.”

She purses her lips.

“But he’s– not.” She says weakly.

Jack shrugs.

“Yeah? And?” He looks away. “Blake and Doctor Aston do good work. You wouldn’t’ve come here if you didn’t know that.”

Sierra frowns openly now.

“And you’re just– okay with that?”

He frowns back.

“I have to be.” Jack tells her blankly. “There’s no one else that actually likes or talks to me. To my face, at least.”

She flushes, but it’s not an angry one.

She just looks embarrassed at having been caught.

Like everyone always does.

“I have ears, you know. They work just fine.” He says evenly. “And you guys’ve been talking about me since elementary. Who else am I supposed to talk to when everyone’s always gossiping?”

Sierra doesn’t say anything.

He picks up steam.

“You don’t get to judge me. We’re not friends. You haven’t earned it.”

Then Blake pops up from the other side of the counter with a heavy duty chain slung over his shoulder, and the conversation is over.

“Alright, lets go.” He rumbles. “Lead the way, kid.”

Sierra opens the door with maybe too much force, too much haste to get out.

She pauses though.

Just for a second.

“I’m sorry.” She whispers.

Jack doesn’t look at her.

“For getting called out. Maybe try again when you mean it.”

And then she’s out the door and heading for, presumably, her bike.

Blake comes up behind him.

“You feel better?” He asks softly.

Jack digs his nails into the rubber grip of the toolbox.

“No.” He says quietly. “Not really. Maybe I will later, though.”

Blake squeezes his shoulder once.

“Maybe you will.

Every year on the same day R.C. draws into herself and won’t speak.

His mom does the exact same thing on the anniversary of the day Jack’s dad left.

The first two times, she just didn’t show up that day.

It was the third and all the ones after it that she would drive to their house, put her bike in the garage, plant herself against a wall in the living room and just… watch.

Hands twitching, flinching and reacting to every sound.

Like she was scared they were going to slip through her fingers, or that they were going to be attacked, or that something, somewhere, would go wrong.

Those days, those were the ones where R.C. looked fragile.

Small.

Terrified.

And that in itself was terrifying, because R.C. was one of the strongest people he knew.

It’s also kind of a stark reminder.

Of the fact that whatever war they’ve all been fighting, it’s a war.

A war they’ve been fighting for far longer than Jack’s even been alive.

And you can’t save everyone.

Jack is fifteen years old when Doctor Aston laughs in his face at the idea of working at KO Burger.

For some reason, it’s the funniest thing he’s ever heard.

Apparently.

Blake seems to be in on the joke, but doesn’t laugh.

Just snorts and smiles into his hands.

After winding down from the worst of it, Doctor Aston looks at him like he’s stupid.

“Of course you’re not working there.” He croons. “You’re working for us.”

Knowing is different from seeing.

Knowing is almost always different from seeing.

You can know without seeing, and you can see without knowing.

It’s one thing for Jack to know about the Astons being on a different side from everyone else.

It’s another entirely to see Bruce– the man who drives the off roader– and Blake at each other’s throats.

At the very least, nobody else seems to like it either.

Doctor Aston is tense like a live wire, and Ratchet has his lips pursed, arms crossed.

Cliff is unusually neutral, blank almost, B watching with raised shoulders and clenched fists, and R.C. seems to be the only one out of all of them that’s anywhere close to relaxed, leaning against a wall.

He’s not sure exactly what Orion’s feeling because his bandana is drawn tight around his face, covering his mouth and his jaw.

But he knows it means at least that he’s not comfortable.

It’s Orion’s tic.

His one give away.

The tension rises, and Jack isn’t sure who to stand by at this point– Orion and R.C. and Ratchet, or Doctor Aston who only has him and Blake for support.

He ends up waffling in the middle as Blake and Bruce grow more and more unintelligible with their yelling.

Unintelligible in the sense that they’re cutting each other off and unintelligible in the sense that the language they’re speaking is not one he knows.

A weird mish-mash of clicks and whirs and whines and full syllables all melting into each other at a rapid fire pace.

“Are we just going to let them scream at each other?” He whispers apprehensively.

Doctor Aston glances at him for a split second, eyes red, before focusing back on the screaming match.

“They have old history,” he mumbles, and the way he says it sounds sharp and sour. “Used to be brothers in arms and all that before Blake switched sides. They’ve been beating each other half to death on sight ever since. This is all rather tame in comparison.”

Jack grimaces, and that seems to be about when Ratchet finally reaches his breaking point, because he marches right up between Bruce and Blake and shoves them with a shouted, “ENOUGH! Both of you!”

Bruce stumbles back with gritted teeth, with pale knuckles, but turns and stalks away to stand behind Cliff anyway.

Blake seethes in place, sharp teeth bared, eyes gold, and then Jack catches his eye and he– 

Settles.

Smooths out.

Like a cat’s fur laying flat as it walks away from a fight.

His whole body flickers for a split second, resetting back to dull canines and brown irises, and then he takes a place at Doctor Aston’s shoulder.

Bruce watches the whole thing with a furrowed brow and a closed mouth scowl.

Orion sighs, then.

“Can we now come to a decision?” He asks with furrowed brows and what could be disappointment, and it’s like the whole room wilts under the weight of it.

Blake crosses his arms.

“Jack and K.O.– you don’t touch them.” He rumbles.

Orion gives a small nod.

“Jack was never in any danger, but we will not harm you or your Conjunx, on the condition that you do not harm us.” He assures him patiently. “A truce, if you will.”

Doctor Aston gives a stiff nod, inching closer into Blake.

“We’ll stay in our little part of Jasper, and you stay in yours.” He says.

Bruce makes a scoffing noise.

“Yeah? And how long is that going to last?” He says over R.C. making a shut up motion with her hand. “Until old buckethead shows up? Until you get sick of playing by the rules? How do we know that we can even trust you?”

Jack winces, a little.

Because he sounds… really bitter.

Upset, almost.

Betrayed.

Like this whole thing is a rusted knife between the ribs.

Like Blake just being in the same space as him is an open wound.

Why does everything have to be so complicated?

Why can’t they all just– just exist and not fight?

Why does there have to be bad blood and old factions?

Can’t they just– can’t they just call a truce and be done with it?
Can’t they just accept a tentative peace?

“You don’t have to trust them.” Jack hears someone say. “You just have to trust me.”

Everyone zeroes in on him and–

And–

Oh.

Oh.

He said that.

He licks his lips and crosses his arms.

Idiot.

“You don’t have to trust them.” Jack repeats unsteadily. “So trust me instead, because I do.”

Ratchet is–

He’s doing something complicated with his face.

Something that almost looks pained.

Like he’s remembering something that isn’t there.

Orion just looks… tired.

But the corners of his eyes are creased so… maybe he’s smiling.

Not a lot.

But maybe a little.

And the whole thing looks… maybe a kind of like pride.

Jack isn’t sure what Bruce is.

Maybe just… stunned.

Startled.

Like he wasn’t expecting Jack to say anything.

To be fair, Jack wasn’t expecting himself to say anything either.

A hand touches his shoulder.

Doctor Aston says something he doesn’t understand, but with a reluctance that means it’s probably something nice, and Blake smiles, just a little.

“You’re a good spark, kid.” He says, smile growing. “You didn’t have to do that.”

He frowns.

Blake.

No.

Don’t be stupid.

“Of course I did.” Jack says, as easy as breathing and sure as the rising sun.

His mom always looks a little tired when she gets home, a little dragged down and bogged, but it–

It gets better, when there’s moments that R.C. is waiting for her with Jack.

It’s like watching a flower grow in fast forward.

She straightens out of the slouch, just a bit, rising higher, and her face smooths from that exhaustion to something warm and fond.

R.C. makes his mom happy just by existing.

She can’t be there all the 24/7.

She still goes off the grid for days at a time sometimes.

But she’s there often enough.

She’s there often enough for Jack and his mom’s house to start feeling full again.

He isn’t actually sure why they flicker.

Why they glitch or go transparent.

He’s never seen them disappear all the way, either.

Only ever half jumps, sparing moments, where they step out of reality for the barest second before snapping back into place.

He’s thought about it before, but never in depth.

Mostly because he’s just… he doesn’t know what they are.

He doesn’t have enough information.

About what they all really are and what the projections are.

Because they’re solid and there and real.

You can touch them.

So they can’t be like the holograms on sci-fi TV that you can walk through because they’re just light.

Blake’s picked him up enough times to prove that much at least.

Jack hasn’t asked exactly what they are.

In general or about the projections.

It feels… rude, almost.

Jack knows they aren’t human, and they know that he knows.

They aren’t overt about it, but at the same time, they’re not trying to hide it from him.

Not from him, and, presumably, not from his mom.

Fowler probably already knows but can’t tell them because he was either asked not to, or because of like… security clearance.

Something.

The point is, is that they all know.

They all know he knows.

That doesn’t matter.

What does is when they’re actually going to tell him.

“What if I punched him.” Blake suggests lightly, but it doesn’t sound as much like a question as it should.

Jack frowns.

“I already punched him. Like, two years ago.” He looks over the edge of the counter and out the window. “Does he really need to be punched again?”

“I don’t want to serve him,” Blake growls back. “Can’t serve someone if they’re unconscious.”

“He’s like fifteen years old, Blake. I’m fifteen years old. If anyone should punch him, it’s me.” He squints as the shadow makes another paced loop. “And I’m not gonna punch him unless he says something to deserve it.”

Blake doesn’t respond.

And then he doesn't respond for longer so Jack looks over and he–

His eyes are wide.

Huge and gold.

“You’re what?” He hisses in a strangled whisper.

Jack squints.

“I’m fifteen? I’ll be sixteen soon?” He offers helplessly. “Did you, uh, forget?”

Horror sinks even further into Blake’s face.

“Oh Primus I forgot how young you were,” he wheezes. “Your species is so young I– you’re fifteen. You aren’t even a centivorn.” 

“I don’t know what that means but I’m– I’m sorry?” Jack says back.

Blake looks over the edge of the counter with a new kind of trepidation in his eyes.

“Who's rearing that squishy?” He hisses furiously. “Are they all like that? Are you just weird?”
Jack made a face at that… whole chunk of stuff.

“I, uh, I’ve been told I’m mature for my age? But most people aren’t bullies like Vince.” He adds quickly at Blake’s look. “He’s just taking out stuff on other people. That’s what most bullies do. His parents or home life or whatever probably aren’t the best, so he’s just cruel.”

He stops to think about all the nice clothes, the nice car and the bad grades and the bad attitude.

Hrm.

Jack purses his lips.

“Sometimes people are cruel though, for cruelty’s sake. Or he could be like that because he wants attention, or because he doesn’t know any other way to act. I don’t know.”

Blake’s eyes are wide again.

“You–” he frowns suddenly. Looks almost sad. “You have a lot ‘a this figured out.”

Jack shrugs.

“Vince’s been bullying me for a long time.” He says helplessly, because what else is he supposed to? “I’ve had years to do research.”

Blake frowns too.

“And it doesn’t bother you?”

Jack shrugs.

“I can’t let it bother me.” He replies with more roughness to his voice than he wants.

He’s had years to get used to it.

The things Vince says, they don’t bother him.

They don’t bother him because if they did, he’d never be able to get anything done.

It doesn’t mean it doesn’t suck, though.

Blake still has that almost sadness on his face when he abruptly stands up.

“Well just because it doesn’t bother you, doesn’t mean we have to put up with it.” He announces gruffly. “He can go somewhere else. We’re going driving.”

He’s holding out a hand to pull Jack up.

“Are you sure?”

Blake snorts and rolls his eyes.

“Yeah, I'm sure.” 

“This is a terrible idea.” Jack declares for the third time.
R.C. is undeterred and grins fiercely.

“It’s promoting cooperation is what it is.” She says brightly.

“It is literally not.” He protests. “This is capture the flag but the flag is me and I’m running from all of you.”

“Exactly.” R.C. says confidently. “Working towards a common goal.”

“Who’s idea was this?” He tries in a last ditch effort.

R.C. waves a hand in a dismissive gesture. 

“Don’t worry about it.”

"It was Ratchet, wasn't it?"

"Don't worry about it." R.C. repeats.

"Was it–"

"Alright!" R.C. shouts over him easily, and everyone turns to focus on her. "You all know the rules. Jack has fifteen minutes to find a place and hide. After that, the two teams scatter and try to bring him back to their base. Team A is Cliff, Bruce, and I. Team B is K.O., Blake, and B. Orion holds the base for Team B, and Ratchet has the base for Team A. Got it?"

A ripple goes through them as the teams split, and R.C. moves to stand with Cliff and Bruce.

Ratchet and Orion step into place behind Jack.

He's smiling, and his bandana is down.

This was totally his idea.

But he looks… really happy.

He looks really happy, watching B sign rapidly at Doctor Aston and Blake, at R.C. whispering with Cliff and Bruce.

At all of them, laughing.

And Jack can't fault him for that.

Ratchet outs a hand on his shoulder.

"Ready?" He asks quietly. "You can back out if you don't feel like being chased. I'm sure B or R.C. would love to be the flag, as you say."

Jack tears his gaze away from them all, for one moment, to look at Ratchet.

His face is slightly, ever so slightly, open.

Just as warm as Orion.

"Nah," Jack replies softly, and looks back to the teams. "I think I'll be okay."

Jack is sixteen years old and every day feels like stepping closer and closer to a storm front.

Like walking closer and closer to the edge.

And he doesn't know what's at the bottom of the fall.

But maybe…

Maybe it's neon-electric blue.

Jasper is a small town.

It’s a small town and everybody knows everybody.

People don’t have much better to do than talk.

Everybody stays, nobody leaves.

New people don’t happen to Jasper often.

So everyone knows when they get an exchange student.

Everyone.

And it's not exactly like she tries to hide.

If anything, she does the opposite.

The thing about being one of many pariahs is that there's at least other people to talk to that get it.

There's Orion and Ratchet and R.C. and B and Bruce and Cliff.

He'd say Blake and Doctor Aston too, but they don't really seem to be bothered by it.

Jack still talks to them about the whole thing, kind of, but they aren't as bothered.

Ratchet gets it the most though.

He understands the people being wary of being seen talking to you thing.

Of having things said about you that are cruel and wrong and untrue.

He gets it.

His mom talks to Ratchet too, he knows, him and Fowler and maybe even Orion.

He's glad she has friends.

He doesn't know about the people at the hospital, but she's never said anything about it.

Jack's her son, though.

He's not sure that she would mention something like that.

To R.C., maybe, but not him.

Wouldn't want to worry him, probably.

The point is, though, is that when Ratchet is showing him how to piece a car back together, or build another one of the phones he made, or parse through glyphs that make up the roaring, clicking, flowing language that Bruce and Blake had screamed at each other, they get off topic.

They get off topic because Jack had had years to get used to the whispers and words but they still sting.

Less the words themselves, and more the actions.

He grew up with those people.

He is growing up with these people.

And they still… turned their backs on him, kids like him and adults he's never met.

Because of who he talked to.

And the weight of that is just… 

It's heavy.

And it hurts.

And some days it makes him so angry he forgets how to speak.

He doesn't like being angry.

It feels wrong on him.

Like he's a cup too full and fit to overflow.

Fit to rush and pool over the edges and–

And Jack doesn't know what.

He doesn't know.

He just knows that he hates feeling angry.

He hates people talking about him and his mom and his friends behind his back.

He hates that people just let it happen even if they don't say anything themselves.

He hates it.

He hates it.

And it leaves him hollow.

So sometimes… 

His talks with Ratchet get off topic.

And they don't find their way back for a long time.

"You're Jack Darby."

It's not a question.

He doesn't look up.

Jack knows who she is.

"That's me."

There's nothing for a moment.

And then there's a loud huff as the girl sits on his desk.

"You're Jack Darby," she repeats. "And everyone talks about you."

Yeah.

He knows.

"Does this have a point?" He asks his worksheet.

"Duh," the girl says, and leans almost sideways so that she can look directly in his face, grinning. "Everyone talks about you. And I wanna know why."

Miko is weird.

Not as weird and Blake and R.C. and everyone, but still weird.

Normal human kinda weird instead of vaguely horrifying slightly unsettling possible fae creature kinda weird.

They're not really friends, he doesn't think, but it's.

You know.

Someone that actually talks to him.

And it's kind of nice.

To have new people to talk to.

Even when they're people like Miko that like to text him at all hours and bug him during school.

R.C. takes in all his complaints though, and just laughs.

Blake is quiet today, and the radio is off.

His edges are soft, and his whole body looks thin.

Not quite transparent.

But it doesn't look like he's really there.

Doctor Aston is standing with him too.

He usually stays in the backroom, working on whatever, but today he's leaning on the counter with both hands, eyes distant.

Jack doesn't know what happened.

What he's supposed to do.

How he's supposed to fix it.

And after a long, long silence, when Jack is just about to leave, Blake says something.

He says, "You asked me what I was gonna do. When it finally got here. You asked me what I was gonna do."

Blake's gold, gold eyes land on him.

Jack swallows, and feels his shoulders tense.

"I did." He manages to croak out.

It feels like there's a vice around his throat, or all the pressure of a storm at his back.

This is important.

This is important.

Blake's edges seem to sharpen into focus, and his hands curl into fists on the counter top.

"I like this planet," he whispers with a finality that weighs so very, very heavy. "More than I thought I would. It's a good planet. And I'm not gonna see it turned into a lifeless husk. I'm not doin' that slag again. Not now, not ever."

Doctor Aston leans his blurring sides into Blake.

"I told you it was a long time past the age of redemption," he says to Jack, voice echoing and traveling so much further than it should, "and I'm not taking that back, because I was right. But that's no reason to waste an entire planet, even if it is one crawling with organics."

Jack flexes his knuckles, the skin turning white.

"So what are you going to do? Now?"

Blake's face is made of stone.

"I'm not sure," he says honestly, and then bares his teeth in a snarl that isn't anything human. "But I'm not going back to the Nemesis. Not unless it's to send the whole damn thing crashing into the sea."

Blake and Doctor Aston saying I'm not going back isn't the same as switching sides, but it is something.

It's Doctor Aston talking with Ratchet and Blake wrestling with Bruce.

It's comparing glyphs and dialects and the best way to fix an engine.

It's quiet talks between them all while Jack does his homework, and hasty introductions to his mother.

It's a quieter hostility.

It's a bigger space to breathe.

It's the two halves coming together and making home.

The edge finally drops out from under him in a sunset and a car chase.

In R.C. picking him up ten minutes before she was supposed to, panic in her eyes.

In a flicker of reality and glowing fuel and speed gauges.

In figuring out why the voices carry and shadows haze and the edges blur.

In an adrenaline fueled rush and a jump he's practiced a hundred times, a thousand times.

In seeing R.C. flicker and fold and turn into something so much more.

Because the aliens, they didn’t hit Roswell.

They hit Jasper.