Chapter Text
The hospital room was bad.
The police station was worse.
Jax stared at the table in front of him, furiously, like it was going to give him any sort of answer. It was the same way the detective was staring at him.
"Mister Jiang," The detective tried again. Jax didn't look up. "We just need to understand what happened to you."
"I told you," He said, hoarsely. "I don't remember. I woke up in the hospital, don't remember anything before that."
He wasn't really telling the truth, obviously. He remembered some things- the circus, the people in it, the people who weren't in it anymore- but most things before that… were blurry at best. He didn’t even remember how he got out.
He knew his name. He knew where he was from. Neither of these things really belonged to him: he wasn't Owen Jiang from Tampa anymore. He hadn't been for five years.
"Mister Jiang-" The detective started, but he looked up as a knock on the door sounded, followed by an officer's head. The officer nodded, once, glanced at Jax, and then pulled her head back out. The detective sighed, putting his papers back in the file. "Six people showed up unconscious after being missing for unknown lengths of time, you have to understand how strange this is. If you and the others were being held hostage, law enforcement needs to know. Please, if you remember anything else…"
"I'll give you a call," Jax sneered. "Don't worry."
"Alright. Your brother is waiting for you in the lobby."
Jax was out of the room before he could say anything more, breezing out the door.
Barny stood in the lobby, like the detective had told him he would be, hands behind his back. He was tall, like Jax, but not quite as gangly, not quite as strangely proportioned. Jax was skin and bones, even out here, with a weird posture that slumped back like he was a cowboy about to draw. Barny? Barny stood perfectly upright, sharp eyes on Jax before the older man had even registered who he was looking at.
"How'd it go?" Barny asked as Jax passed him, sweeping out the door. "Did they help?"
"Where the fuck do you think we are, shit brain?" Jax snorted. "They're cops, they don't help anyone."
He didn't say what he was thinking: the one thing they could help with, and he wasn’t even sure he wanted it. He still didn't know what happened to anyone else. He hadn't seen any of them since he left the circus, and he wasn't really sure what to do about it. Maybe this was for the better. Maybe this was how it should be.
"Hey," Barny said, unlocking the car. "I've got some errands to run, 'member? Would you be willing to come with, or do you need to go back to the apartment to unwind?"
Barny was kind enough to let Jax stay in his apartment for the time being, especially since Jax had apparently been living on his ex girlfriend's couch up until the circus. And, no, that relationship was not salvageable. He'd asked.
"I'll come with," Jax swung into the passenger seat. "Really don't have anything better to be doing right now."
"Copy."
Barny was a weird dude, Jax thought, but he really wasn't that bad.
From what he remembered, he'd always been tough on the kid. He felt really bad about that now, considering the younger man had been the only one to visit him when he'd been in the hospital.
It was late enough in the evening that the grocery store was pretty much completely empty, just the cashiers and a few stray customers, so Jax didn't feel as weird about wandering the aisles, looking at the colorful packaging, gazing at the food in awe. He'd only been out of the circus for a few days, and he'd been eating hospital food up until this point.
He'd thrown up his first meal, and then cried in Barny's arms for hours.
It took Barny half an hour to get everything, and another fifteen minutes to get Jax to stop staring at the meat counter and follow him to the register.
"I just- you know how long it's been since I had good food?" Jax complained, sneering at the cart full of veggies and breads. "You got- what, one pack of bacon? You can do better, c'mon. Can I get gum?"
"Can you pay for it?" Barny asked, not looking up from the conveyer belt.
Jax huffed, putting the gum back and accidentally making eye contact with the cashier. He smiled, awkwardly, but the man didn't look away, still staring at him, hard.
"I'm not gonna steal the fucking gum dude, chill. I put it back." Jax said, trying to keep his tone light. Had the press run a news story on him and the others or something? What the fuck was happening here?
The man seemingly forced his gaze away, finally starting to scan and bag the groceries for them. Barny seemed unbothered, but Jax felt his hands itching. He hated the idea of people knowing about him- knowing what happened to him. Or, really, thinking they knew what had happened to him.
The cashier didn't speak the whole time, just sort of weakly pointing towards the receipt machine instead of asking Barny if he wanted it, his eyes flicking to Jax the whole time.
"Do I have something on my face?" Jax finally snapped.
The guy's eyes narrowed, his lips pressing together, and, finally, he spoke. "Jax?"
Jax' spine went ramrod straight, his heart plunging. He knew that voice. He knew that voice.
"Kauf-" His voice cracked, his blood running cold. "How- you- what….?"
"Owen?" Barny asked, anxiously. "Owen, what's happening?"
Kaufmo gazed at him, lips pressed firmly together. He didn't look how Jax thought he would- instead of the tall, thin clown, this guy was short, stubby, shaggy hair and a lame little mustache. He looked miserable, and a little bit angry.
Of course he looked angry, why wouldn't he?
Jax did what he did best.
He turned, and ran.
He made it out to the parking lot before realizing the car was still locked, so he didn’t even try, he just… ran.
He ran, and he ran, and he kept running.
Run rabbit, run, he thought, and for a second, he felt his ears pin against his head, before he remembered he didn’t have ears- he wasn’t in that circus anymore.
He wasn’t in there.
He was fine.
Barny found him two hours later, huddled in the bushes of the park, right where he used to hide when he ran away as a kid.
He didn’t say anything. Neither of them did.
Barny didn’t press, didn’t pry, didn’t even ask. Just led Owen back to the car, and drove him home.
The apartment was small, but cozy, a nice vanilla cherry smell in the air. It was nice.
Jax curled up on the couch, staring at the coffee table. Barny was cooking something or other, but he couldn’t focus on what that could possibly be.
Kaufmo made it out. And if Kaufmo made it out-
Barny’s phone rang, and he answered, his voice a quiet drone in the background of the day, only for it to come in sharp relief with one word.
“-Mom- no I know. He’s fine, he’s not-” Jax stared at Barny’s back, searing holes in it, and Barny must have felt it, because he turned around, shook his head at him. “He’s being good.”
Jax bristled. He felt like he was in middle school again, sitting in the principal’s office after a fight, knowing he was about to get in trouble for something he really wasn’t the instigator of.
Oh, no, he couldn’t remember his mother’s name, but he knew that he hated her, and it was entirely mutual.
“I know. Okay, I’ll tell him.”
Jax took a deep breath, watching Barny hang up, coming over to sit next to him on the couch. “What’d the hag want?”
“Okay, come on,” Barny pleaded. “You can’t stay mad at her forever.”
“Yeah? Watch me.”
“… She wanted me to say that there was a news van out front of her house today.”
“What am I supposed to do about that?” Jax snapped, regretting it immediately when Barny winced.
“She was saying she was trying to contact the other people who showed up. She said…” Barny paused, chewing his lip. “She said she wanted you to do an interview with them.”
A shudder ran down Jax’ back, and his hands prickled. “Barny-”
“I know, I know, you don’t know them, but-”
“I can’t see them again,” Jax blurted, not really meaning to. “I can’t. They’ll hate me.”
They sat in that, Barny staring at him with wide eyes, processing, while Jax wondered if he could walk back to the store and tell Kaufmo to just kill him.
He definitely wanted to, if that face meant anything.
Jax wondered what happened when the abstracted people got back. If they woke up in hospitals, with news crews following them down the hall any time they got up to piss.
Maybe they didn’t.
He hoped they did, though.
Ribbit was out here somewhere, and he imagined for a second what he’d say to the press.
Suck me, probably.
How the hell was he supposed to hunt down Ribbit, the only person out here who might not fucking hate his guts? He had to see him again, somehow, anyhow.
“I’ll do it,” He said. “I’m sorry, I’ll do it.”
Barny gave him a look. It was a specific look he’d gotten from their dad, one that Jax remembered all too well. It was his ‘we’ll talk about this later’ look. His ‘I didn’t miss that comment, I just don’t want to bother with it right now’ look. And he nodded.
Jax thanked every possible thing that may exist in heaven or hell or wherever else that he had such a merciful little brother.
The press conference was arranged by his mother. They were to meet in a little hotel conference room, six chairs against the wall, a hoard of reporters before them. One microphone, and no coherent story.
Jax was the first there. Well, there was seven or eight news crews, of course, cameras against the wall. He’d known this was a big story, but he hadn’t realized…
He was wearing a button up shirt under his sweatshirt, not that anyone could see. Barny had told him he looked gross, he had laughed. “Good, let them see the real authentic me.”
He lounged in his chair, drumming his fingers against his knee.
The reporters were all looking at him curiously, but any time any of them made any move to speak to him, his mother, in a rare act of grace and mercy, would swoop in and snap that they needed to wait.
His mother was still just as scary and severe looking as she had been when he was a kid, he was learning.
The door opened. A very bashful looking woman in a black sweater, her blond hair framing her face, keeping gazes out. It had to be Gangle.
She saw Jax, balked. He smiled.
In the corner of his eye, Barny frowned.
“Am I late?” She asked, weakly, as his mother ushered her to sit beside Jax. “I’m sorry, the email said-”
“You’re on time. Early even. Don’t worry.”
Before Gangle could even sit, the door opened again, and two people stepped in. A tall man with a weary face and a small woman with a messy pixie cut. The man patted the woman on the back, moving to stand in the back of the room, and the woman shoved back her shoulders, waved at the reporters, who all eagerly began snapping photos, and went to sit beside Gangle.
“Hey Pom-pom,” Jax hissed. “Is that your boyfriend?”
“Shut up.” She hissed, and he raised an eyebrow. Not a no.
Zooble arrived a few minutes later, hobbling into the room, a small kid with the same dark skin and freckled nose following. The reporters buzzed, but Zooble snapped out a hand, covering his face before any cameras could flash.
“If my son ends up on the news,” They said, loudly and clearly. “All of you are getting sued.”
The kid settled on the floor beside Barny’s chair, pulling out a tablet.
It was harder to keep the questions at bay now. None of them acknowledged the reporters, but that didn’t seem to stop them.
“Mister Jiang,” One burly man called. “Is it true you’ve been avoiding police questions?”
Jax picked his teeth.
The door opened, and three people walked in.
A older, pale man with a limp led the young red headed woman to the front of the room to sit, while an older, dark skinned woman walked straight to the back of the room.
The second Ragatha’s ass hit the chair between Kinger and Zooble, the room erupted. Jax’ mother immediately strode forward, handing him a mic, and smiling coldly.
“Thanks mom,” He said directly into the mic, making sure everyone could hear. “Means a lot.”
The room buzzed at that, various cameras flashing as everyone made sure to get his intense eye contact. Not a single person seemed to understand the sarcasm dripping from him.
“Mister Jiang-”
“Owen, please.” Jax beamed, making sure to show all of his teeth. He was still slouched, one leg over the arm of the chair. The reporters didn’t seem bothered.
“Owen,” The man tried again. “Is it true none of you have met before this?”
“Well, it’s hard to say,” He said. “I don’t remember, which doesn’t mean it couldn’t have happened. For me, at least, I was hoping these faces would jog my memory, but… well, I can’t say they’re familiar.”
He glanced at the others, and, to his surprise, Pomni nodded once, reaching for the microphone. He handed it to her, curiously.
“Like… uh, Owen, said. I don’t remember anything. Any questions about what happened while we were missing may not help.”
Kinger leaned forward, and added. “The cops have already asked us a million times, as well, if we had anything helpful, we would have said something.”
Jax fought the urge to laugh. So they did have a story.
That’s good.
The door slid open, and his eyes snapped to it. A man with cornrows stepped in. He looked markedly out of place, wearing a hoodie and a pair of black cargo pants, no suit, no nothing. He slid across the wall, towards the back of the room, and none of the reporters even looked up, but the second he got to the back corner, he looked up, and he grinned at Jax.
His grin was the same.
It was impossible to say how- the face was different in every possible way, but the grin was the exact goddamn same.
And, as Jax stared at Ribbit, the one man he’d ever felt safe around, the one man he’d done all of this for, he felt distinctly and unavoidably afraid.