Claire pointed at the sketch.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGyoGV0sHoS
Drawn with a black pen, the jagged line cut through the center like a torn zipper. Twisted. Uneven. Wrong.
“This is what I saw,” she said, voice dry like windblown dust. “In the sky.”
Batman. Nightwing. Robin. All standing around her, staring at the paper.
Yep. Batman was back.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNDqErieN0p
Sure, she’d just seen him “yesterday,” but that was only true for her. Not for them.
They didn’t remember yesterday.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQem04Ftvet
She was the only one who did.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡc7MxPgEsmE
Again.
50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ39DqJjtq1h
One hour ago
50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0kiZB3wrp2
She stood up. Her joints felt stiff—like that rip in the sky had somehow traveled down her spine and into her bones.
“Can you guys... just look at the sky?”50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWrwoopOsnd
She asked it like someone who already knew the answer, but still had to ask.
Nightwing and Robin exchanged glances. Then, dutifully, they looked up.
Professional sky-gazing faces.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfPmitu1VlJ
Like it was part of a rooftop protocol.
Nothing.
“No, not like that,” Claire snapped. “Close your eyes. Look with your eyes closed.”
It made no logical sense. But she sounded very sure of it.
Nightwing hesitated a beat, then obeyed.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEwqDuXbU5n
Robin looked at her like she’d just asked him to smell the sidewalk—but closed his eyes too.
Two vigilantes. On a rooftop. At night.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPfRRQLBzeg
Standing still with eyes shut and faces to the sky.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwi4E7aMFkM
It looked like some weird silent ritual.
And honestly?50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuYF4D5iRbS
Kinda hilarious.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAMrOzxDV6m
But Claire couldn’t even smile.
Her fists were clenched, palms sweaty.
A few seconds passed.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYLuuhtPIwN
Then they opened their eyes and shook their heads.
“Nothing.”
Her stomach dropped.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡc33fPJ5yv2
Not disappointment—50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡcYUaUJBDYJ
More like that awful sensation when the last thread holding you to reality starts to snap.
“Please,” she said, softly.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡO9SS0WfNnu
“Tell Batman. I need help.”
Her voice was nearly emotionless.
50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKXOxcdKFmb
By the time Batman arrived, Claire looked like someone who’d just walked out of a morgue.
Pale. Hollow.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡysTT21sCPF
As if the inside of her brain had been scrubbed raw.
She spoke without inflection. No energy for theatrics.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPZrlH0rttZ
Just repeated the same thing.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAzgvOXikht
Over. And over.
She’d already said it yesterday.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡK50Jszp07i
She was saying it again today.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgdvcioo82o
Now it was Round Three.
What was this, a dystopian Groundhog Day?
Could she just get a USB port installed in her head or something?50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxS0op6dOHc
Upload her trauma and call it a day?
Batman listened silently. His face gave nothing away.
Then he said,
“Draw it.”
Claire blinked. Then nodded.
She went behind the counter and rummaged through a drawer. Pulled out a box of pens—the kind she used for doodling on coffee cups.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYfBy6CGsJC
Hearts on Valentine’s. Pumpkins in October.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡoev8MuEllh
Nothing too serious. Just scribbles for customers when business was slow.
She took a deep breath.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡv8AckoAcsW
Then hunched over the table and began to draw.
The pen scratched against paper. Each stroke felt like it was being yanked out of her skull.
The drawing wasn’t pretty.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡn8FISNRlXm
But it was exact.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnAQwNT8jYB
That split in the sky—a zipper, a rift, maybe an eye—whatever it was, it didn’t belong to this world.
She slid the paper across the table.
Batman. Nightwing. Robin.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAvgobzAxiB
All three stared.
Three different faces.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSAEt356PjI
Three different kinds of silence.
Claire studied them. Her voice, barely above a whisper:
“So… what do you think this is?”
It was the kind of whisper that floats like paper against a windowpane.
But her eyes were deadly serious.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡo6RXqIsC2J
The kind of serious that said:
If you tell me I made this up, I’m going to lose it. For real.
50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnSTelfkQSO
Claire figured she couldn’t really blame them if they thought she was insane.
Honestly, if their roles were reversed, she might’ve thought the same. Who wouldn’t, when someone calmly claimed they were reliving the same day over and over—and also happened to “see the sky split open” when they shut their eyes? It sounded like something between a sci-fi novel and a psychiatric evaluation.
Batman stared at the sketch for a long time.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgerAzPbYJJ
His gaze didn’t just study it—it drilled into it, as if he were trying to excavate something buried beneath the paper fibers.
It was the first time Claire realized… he wasn’t as calm as she had assumed.
The silence grew thick, as if some unspeakable truth was quietly pressing out from the sketch itself.
“When did you first see this?”50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡupNw2M50p2
His voice was low—not the kind of low that tried to intimidate, but the kind that sounded like it had swallowed something massive and was now digesting dread.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHLcUnDR1LL
50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCz7sJAPv2P
Claire tried to recall, but her usual nighttime habits got in the way.
She had always avoided going out at night—almost like instinct.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5hkSi9Gj4z
Now, trying to pull memories from a part of the day she’d always kept at arm’s length felt like dragging threads from a blank void.
“I don’t know,” she murmured. “Today was the first time I saw it.”
She immediately wanted to cry—not from sadness, but from how stupid it all felt.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡcnpDRlGhmF
Here she was, explaining some urban-legend-tier nonsense to Batman. With zero proof.
“Do you get headaches? Hear voices?”50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQG1ZQK3c6f
That was Nightwing. His voice was measured, maybe too measured. Like he was running a checklist but didn’t want to admit he was worried.
His eyes gave him away, though.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPI0bAsCRbm
That wasn’t disbelief—it was a quiet, anxious kind of urgency. A desire to help, not dismiss.
Claire shook her head.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHD4SVRL4so
Hard.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfS88KDXWEy
Like shaking would erase every lingering “are you just crazy?” that might be forming in their minds.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8l7zKWH6oB
She was tired of being questioned. Hell, she was already questioning herself.
“Why only her?”50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ9WC2rYzEdK
Robin’s voice cut in—not accusing, but contemplative. His eyes moved between the three of them, searching for a logic flaw he couldn’t patch.
Batman lowered his head.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡw7OykjZ2i3
His cape shifted slightly, like it was hiding the fact that even he didn’t feel so steady anymore.
He didn’t speak.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQFUEe3CeKI
And somehow that silence was worse.
Claire felt it like a chill under the skin. A subtle, creeping sense of dread.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡi4ztFvBavq
Not from the rift. But from his silence.
Then Batman finally spoke.
“If she’s able to consistently perceive a structure no one else can, that implies it’s selectively revealing itself.”
His voice had a kind of emotional distance—not spatial, but psychological.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEjOxFspGr3
It wasn’t comfort. It wasn’t analysis.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5oB84HaArn
It was a warning.
Then he looked at Claire.
And in that moment, his gaze wasn’t warm, or even human.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWNPYg3UCQm
It was clinical.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡd4If7fUjbm
As if she were no longer a person, but a variable.
“This isn’t just about the loop,” he said. “It might be that the rift itself… is looking back at her.”
Claire’s stomach twisted.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnRn8voyWYL
No.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgeX1FTV1iw
This wasn’t just her seeing the rift.50Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbzHJ9ahRQf
The rift… had seen her.
and then Add to home screen.