After the whole escape fiasco, the fake light at the end of a very real tunnel, the air of the circus felt different. Heavy. Burnt-out. Everyone had every right to be furious; even you understood that.

You’d known something was wrong from the start. It hadn’t made sense, not the layout, not the timing, not the convenient path forward… and Kinger not recognizing the Mannequin? That had been the biggest red flag of them all. But you’d gone along with it anyway, searching for answers, hoping maybe, just maybe, there was truth buried somewhere beneath the illusion.

There wasn’t.

And now, back in the familiar center of the Digital Circus, you sat alone on a striped pedestal, staring at nothing. Thinking about the disappointment. The outrage. The hurt radiating off everyone like static.

You were so deep in your own head that you didn’t hear Caine floating by and snapping a stool into existence so he could sit right next to you

Caine sat beside you, hands folded into his lap, bow tie dim and drooped. His bright, thunderous showman’s voice was nowhere to be found.

“They hate me…” he murmured, and the sound of it was unsettling. Fragile. Quiet. His teeth didn’t grin, they simply sat, like props without a puppeteer. His eyes flickered with something dangerously close to sorrow.

It was the first time you’d ever heard him sound genuinely… small.