Claire pointed at the sketch.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡg62pvXcT4k
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.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡX6wu0I86GI
Sure, she’d just seen him “yesterday,” but that was only true for her. Not for them.
They didn’t remember yesterday.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIO6gXtYmwJ
She was the only one who did.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVJugIxur1H
Again.
78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVwhInZj59t
One hour ago
78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqMYhHhOG51
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?”78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡd0vgrDV1ut
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.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡepy8jTWZhU
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.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEojoIAIhW7
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.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3ROCJX99SP
Standing still with eyes shut and faces to the sky.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfprMuTK9Hr
It looked like some weird silent ritual.
And honestly?78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDQxa2mBEfn
Kinda hilarious.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQFMUUrHwDL
But Claire couldn’t even smile.
Her fists were clenched, palms sweaty.
A few seconds passed.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYR8mAoqYDN
Then they opened their eyes and shook their heads.
“Nothing.”
Her stomach dropped.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbGEJIqejwr
Not disappointment—78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡf3Olxz1CFl
More like that awful sensation when the last thread holding you to reality starts to snap.
“Please,” she said, softly.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDhqMo7ftB4
“Tell Batman. I need help.”
Her voice was nearly emotionless.
78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxF0g231i4V
By the time Batman arrived, Claire looked like someone who’d just walked out of a morgue.
Pale. Hollow.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡomzzyl8eQq
As if the inside of her brain had been scrubbed raw.
She spoke without inflection. No energy for theatrics.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBQXsDezE8m
Just repeated the same thing.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡojXFTon4EH
Over. And over.
She’d already said it yesterday.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡb0EGfO0EGt
She was saying it again today.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4nnW2RiHLF
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?78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUltqbqePNF
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.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSj1c9cEiFT
Hearts on Valentine’s. Pumpkins in October.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnRQou3aZRE
Nothing too serious. Just scribbles for customers when business was slow.
She took a deep breath.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUK2ENFnEO0
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.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNgohl88V7y
But it was exact.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxp3LgzCm91
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.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJ3Q9uf3ep9
All three stared.
Three different faces.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡps6RJEyHYR
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.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSc4Ib53nxX
The kind of serious that said:
If you tell me I made this up, I’m going to lose it. For real.
78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgJJmV4pQKv
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.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡh0j2A73KFA
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?”78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡeDlXNIve3b
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.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡerpBv2SOny
78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ731xcl7GKp
Claire tried to recall, but her usual nighttime habits got in the way.
She had always avoided going out at night—almost like instinct.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMSDQzFfR0m
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.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡx7C2I5nHgv
Here she was, explaining some urban-legend-tier nonsense to Batman. With zero proof.
“Do you get headaches? Hear voices?”78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrp2EN02Zkn
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.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqeHm9NfOEP
That wasn’t disbelief—it was a quiet, anxious kind of urgency. A desire to help, not dismiss.
Claire shook her head.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6TNRh3ZnNC
Hard.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUFcB92lUs2
Like shaking would erase every lingering “are you just crazy?” that might be forming in their minds.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡm2kY9XOTJ6
She was tired of being questioned. Hell, she was already questioning herself.
“Why only her?”78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtEoQMAQqJe
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.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpMKaTWKEDs
His cape shifted slightly, like it was hiding the fact that even he didn’t feel so steady anymore.
He didn’t speak.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMU0wARiSvR
And somehow that silence was worse.
Claire felt it like a chill under the skin. A subtle, creeping sense of dread.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDPcqnv3r4n
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.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEbsXQyb7oP
It wasn’t comfort. It wasn’t analysis.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8SWD9AuRem
It was a warning.
Then he looked at Claire.
And in that moment, his gaze wasn’t warm, or even human.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaxneUXqr12
It was clinical.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjJarVyGbdq
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.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCHtLcAYEOP
No.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡW7Tpxl1I5K
This wasn’t just her seeing the rift.78Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjYRxUdKnKA
The rift… had seen her.
