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“So you're the newest member of our little posse?”
Jay turned, hesitantly. To be entirely honest, he wasn't sure about joining up with Ras or his band of misfit villains, or whatever this group was. People were dangerous: he knew that much from his time with the Administration. He had seen what they did to their enemies – and with their firmly utilitarian policies, that was most people, considering nobody other than its employees really followed the rules. But he'd been lonely, and sick and tired of living on the run, and Ras had given him purpose. There was always the off chance that he had been telling the truth, so far – that Jay really had been a mighty warrior in the past. It was difficult to believe, all things considered – he had struggled greatly not to die while the Administration hunted him down. Shouldn't muscle memory have carried him forward if he truly had been that strong of a warrior before the Merge?
Suffice to say, he was confused about a lot of things. Confused was a little of an understatement, even. Still, he was here now, so he would just have to deal with it. And dealing with it meant meeting the other members of the Wolf Clan.
The man in front of him was tall, or at least a little taller than average – although Jay admittedly wasn't all that tall himself, and therefore couldn't really tell what was considered tall. He had unruly hair, gray that tapered off into a darker smog, and smoke-like tattoos ran down the length of his face and neck. They disappeared beneath his shirt, so Jay had no way of telling if they continued below it. As his eyes drew towards the other man's, he grew acutely aware of the absolutely horrendous eyebags beneath his eyes. Seriously, didn't this guy sleep? Ever?
Well, he looked like the kind of guy Jay would have been dissuaded from interacting with, the kind of guy that people gossiped about in the office. He tried his best to keep his expression flat, expressionless, and altogether unimpressed. He definitely was not nervous. He had signed up for this.
“Uhm.” Great, Jay. Great first impression.
The other man raised one thick eyebrow. Abruptly, his expression shifted. “Don't be nervous, man,” he grinned. “We don't bite.”
He paused. “Usually.”
Jay suddenly felt an awful lot more unsure about his position. “Say, newbie. What's your name?”
He needed to get his act together. He was in a rough, scary wolf-cult. Act tough. “Tell me yours first.”
Nailed it!
The other man smirked. “Ballsy, are we?”
O-kay, maybe that was a mistake. “Uhm…”
He changed his demeanour again. Jay was definitely out of his depth. This guy was weird. “Just pulling your leg, man. I'm Cinder.”
“Oh,” he managed. “I'm… Jay. Jay Walker.”
His – Cinder's expression lit up. “You'd fit right in,” he laughed. “But usually we go for more serious crimes.”
Oh shit, that was a pun. He forced a chuckle that sounded more like a strangled, reticent chicken. He was really blowing this, wasn't he?
“Say, what're you in for?” He said, striding forward to spin Jay around with a hand on his back. “I'll show you the ropes – I'm kind of the second-in-command around here.”
Yeah, this Wolf Clan was weird, if this guy was even remotely in charge.
“Uh, I'm kind of… on the run. From the Administration.” It was fine to tell him that. Probably. If he really was Ras’ second in command, he would know anyway.
His grin widened. “Damn, how'd you manage that? Filled out a form wrong? Cut in line?”
What was he supposed to say in this situation? I kind of blew up my department in an escape from my dead-end job that caused me constant anxiety? I was scared they would find out I can control lightning and use me to power their weapons? “I… used to be an employee. I left without filling in a resignation.”
“Office worker, huh? I'm sure we can find someone like you somewhere.”
He faked an extremely small smile. “That would be great…!”
He really hoped they didn't. He didn't want to make friends with the weirdo cult that Ras led. Ras had promised him power, direction, and he was sure that direction wasn't the sociable clan favourite. He was here for Ras, in the name of the camaraderie they could have once held, and nothing more. To get stronger, perhaps. No strings attached, really, except for the thick, blood red string named Ras.
“Making friends, Cinder?”
That was a new voice. It belonged to a redhead woman, with strange tattoos straightening out across the length of her cheekbones. A sign of Imperium, as far as he knew – it was the deciding factor many a time in which realm he should have sent someone off to. Her bangs swooped over her forehead a little ridiculously, the rest of her hair pulled into a bun at the back of her head.
“Just meeting the new meat,” Cinder replied without turning to face her.
Jay did, examining her appearance with scrutiny. Obviously she was no longer involved with Imperium, or she wouldn't be here, and logically speaking the entirety of this clan was a walking defacement of several regulations the Administration was strict about. As far as he knew, Imperium had no ties to the Realm of Madness or the Administration as a whole, either – but she was the first person he had met who had actual ties to several locations he was familiar with. It was better to be safe than sorry.
“Hi,” he said, when she looked at him. “I'm Jay.”
“Jay Walker, he says,” Cinder added.
The woman raises her eyebrows. “Ha-ha. Funny. Cinder, Lord Ras sent me to tell you to go meet him. Training session, or something.”
She looked vaguely disgruntled at having been sent on a fetch quest, which Jay found kind of relatable. He'd always hated having to go get coffee, or paperwork, or anything like that. That had changed when he had become manager, but obviously this woman wasn't the manager equivalent of this strange Wolf Clan, so yeah, he kind of felt bad for her. Just a little bit, though. He was strong and tough now.
Cinder grinned sharply. “Of course, Jordana. Thanks for telling me. Scurry along now, back to your crystal ball.”
Was he wrong, or was there a tension in the air? Jordana – if that was really her name – stared back at Cinder with thinly veiled disgust. He smiled back, flicking his fingers at her in the universal sign of ‘seeya, sucker!’.
“Don't get ahead of yourself, Cinder,” she said at last, warningly. And then her eyes fell on Jay. “Hello. I'm Jordana.” She inclined her head jerkingly towards Cinder. “You should go with him.”
“Sure,” he agreed, a little meekly. “Why?”
She sighed. “You were personally recruited by Lord Ras, weren't you? He should be training you for the Tournament of Sources. Start early.”
Scratch all his previous assumptions, she was much more manager-second-in-command material than Cinder was. And wow, that was a lot of words, most of which he wasn't sure he knew. She'd called Ras Lord Ras, for one, which… considering what he knew about Ras, wasn't particularly surprising. He seemed like the type to demand subservience like that from his subordinates. Was he supposed to address Ras that way too? He didn't know, but he didn't really want to face the consequences of not doing so. But Tournament of Sources? He had no idea what that was. It was an uncomfortable feeling, not knowing. He didn't seem to know a lot of things these days. It was simpler in the Administration, despite the dullness of working 9 to 5 and 9 to 5 and 9 to 5 again, and returning to a bleak apartment provided by the Administrator. He just had to do his job, then, and ignore everything else. Especially his lack of memories. Things weren't so simple now.
“I… yes. Sure,” he mumbled, turning tail and scurrying off after Cinder, who had begun walking away at some point.
To see Ras, presumably.
He didn't know a lot of things, so maybe his decisions were wrong. Bad. Awful, even. He hoped he wouldn't regret this one.
__________
“Feel the Lightning within you,” Ras hissed. “Harness it. Control it.”
Jay kept his eyes firmly shut, like the presence of Ras wasn't bothering him. It was, a little bit. He'd shown up alongside Cinder, and then they'd been put to work doing different things. Cinder, smashing something or other across the courtyard, while Jay bumbled around trying to train his practically non-existent accuracy. It was tough, trying to relearn things he hadn't any recollection of ever learning. A little like learning something entirely new, only there was an insistence in his bones that he knew this, he did, and he just needed to find it again. That was a point in Ras’ favour.
He reached deep into his core, squeezing his eyes shut harder still. It felt like meditation, or something akin to what meditation was supposed to be. It was strange, but there was a crackling of something within him. His Lightning, apparently, but it crackled just out of reach of his metaphorical fingers. He reached harder, as if he could close the distance between him and his power. Something stopped him as he reached for it, as he pulled his fingers towards his element that stayed stubbornly just out of reach. It wasn't so much a movement that kept it away from him, but rather the lack of it – it felt like he couldn't move forward.
Distantly, he felt electricity crackle around his knuckles, worming its way in and out of the crevices from which his fingernails stemmed, curling around his fingers. It did so with familiarity, and yet hesitance. He understood, somewhere deep down. He wasn't the same person.
It built in his palms, making his fingers twitch and spasm with shock – the literal kind. Jay gritted his teeth and pulled at his hands, keeping them flat and uncurled, opening his eyes just a sliver to aim at the target across the courtyard. His arm shook with exertion, both unused to physical activity and elemental use, atrophied from his time as an office worker. His fingers trembled. He shot anyway.
It hit the target, which was more than he could say for the numerous scorch marks littering the walls and floor. It wasn't particularly centred, either, or condensed, as Ras had told him his power should be – but it was an improvement. He looked towards the man himself, who still eyed his work with focus, hoping for… validation? Acknowledgement? Praise? Something.
Ras turned to face him as well. “Try again,” he said, unimpressed. “We don't stop until it is good enough to win.”
Win? Was this about that Tournament of Sources Jordana had mentioned? “Uhm… Ra—”
Cinder spun to face the pair so suddenly Jay almost thought he had been struck. He glanced between the two with urgency, eyes darting to Jay. He mouthed the words ‘don't do it’, or something. Jay wasn't particularly skilled at reading lips.
“ —Lord Ras, win what, exactly?”
Ras’ lips curled, revealing pointed, jagged teeth, that of a predator. “A fight. You'll see,” he responded curtly.
He swallowed. It felt like he had just wandered into dangerous territory. “Okay.”
Ras paused, for a moment, as if waiting for him to continue. When he didn't, he simply turned back to the target board. “Continue.”
Jay did, with an utmost haste. Seriously, Ras was terrifying. Cinder, who had narrowly avoided his stare, returned to his own training.
It was difficult to hit the target, and he only managed about half of the time, and never with the deadly accuracy Ras seemed to expect from him. It was terrifying, a little bit, how utterly horrible he was at everything – if he failed one too many times, would Ras, who valued strength above all, boot him out without a second glance? He really, really, really hoped not. Most of all, it was frustrating. He could feel his temper flare with each failure, each inconsistent success met with nothing but stoicism and a command to carry on. It was a weirdly familiar feeling.
Maybe Ras was right, and he truly had been a mighty warrior. Mighty warriors did training, right? This would mean that he could pick it back up in no time. Hopefully.
By the time evening had fallen, Jay had done… not very well. Ras looked disappointed, if not unsurprised, and left without a backwards glance moments after giving the courtyard a once-over. Jay, who had been training basically non-stop the entire day, nearly collapsed with exhaustion right then and there. Cinder looked much better than Jay felt, although he, too, heaved with exhaustion.
“Shit,” Jay gasped. “Oh my god.”
Cinder grinned, sharklike, stalking over to where Jay had finally let himself collapse onto the flooring’s inlaid stone. “Tough first day, huh?”
“Ras is terrifying,” Jay said in lieu of a response.
Cinder laughed, loud and sharp. “This was an easy day, man. You don't even know half of it.”
“This was easy?”
“Just wait until you have to actually spar with him.”
Jay groaned, thumping his head back against the warm stone like it would jog his muscle memory. Maybe his actual memory, too. That would be nice.
“And it's Lord Ras,” Cinder added absentmindedly, like an afterthought. “Don't address him without it.”
Jay got the feeling he wouldn't like the answer, if he asked for elaboration. He swallowed his questions and shakily got to his knees. “I can't even do regular elemental shit, man. He's gonna eat me alive. Seriously, what's the point of recruiting some useless office bum who can't even do the most basic attacks?”
“You're an elemental master,” he shrugged. “The elemental master of Lightning. That means you're valuable.”
“Lightning?” Jay replied incredulously. “What, so I can power your machines?”
Cinder sighed. “I'm not gonna sit here and explain the history of Ninjago to you or whatever it is you need. I have better things to do. How do you not know this, anyway? I'm from Ninjago too, y'know – even I've heard about the elements.”
“Ninjago? What does that have to do with anything?” He spluttered. “Cinder, I have no idea what you're talking about.”
Cinder narrowed his eyes in reply. “Oh shit, you're serious.”
“Yeah, I'm serious. What the actual hell are you talking about?”
“I thought you were…” he shrugged again. “Never mind.”
Jay huffed out his last breath of exertion, feeling his heart rate stabilise into something less erratic. He got to his feet, slowly, only to pause. “Are you an elemental master too?”
“Yeah,” Cinder said, looking past him. “Smoke.”
“Smoke's an element?” Jay raised an eyebrow. “Isn't that like, a subsection of Fire?”
“Oh, shut up,” Cinder rolled his eyes, grumbling. “Smoke is so much better than Fire.”
A touchy subject, then.
He raised his hands in the universal sign for ‘I surrender’, or in this case, probably ‘sure, man. I don't know. I'm the amnesiac here’.
“Sure, man,” he said, hoping desperately that it didn't come across as sarcastic. That wouldn't go well. “Smoke's an element. I'm sure weirder stuff exists.”
“You would know, wouldn't you,” he mused. “Administration, and all that.”
He winced. Yes. Right. That tidbit that he'd told Cinder and expected never to be brought up again. “Yeah, I guess so.”
They lapsed into silence, Jay awkwardly shifting from foot to foot in an effort to distract himself from the pins and needles flickering into his palms. Man, it was uncomfortable. And irritating. He wanted to scratch at his hands, but that would make it more annoying, probably. Cinder looked him up and down with a vague smirk, and Jay couldn't really tell if he was gloating about something, knew something funny, or if that was just his natural expression – to always look somewhat pretentious and cocky. All three were equally possible.
“I'm gonna… go,” Jay said eventually, when the tension got too stifling. “Shack up in my room. Or something.”
Cinder grinned. “Sure, man. Make yourself at home.”
So Jay left Cinder standing in the middle of the courtyard, not bothering to give him a backwards glance. He was strange, certainly, but he wasn't half as bad as Jay had thought he would be. This place wasn't, so far. He hoped it stayed that way.
__________
Jay officially hated it here. It was grueling, and torturous, and all things sinister and awful. Ras had been training him following that first day – coming up to about three months, actually – insisting in that gruff way that sounded more like commanding – and it was, wasn't it, because Jay was much too afraid to defy him – that he continue to train his element until he was at least proficient in it. It was slow going. Every time he reached inwards, he felt the same frustration he had for the entire week, that invisible force keeping him from accessing what he knew he should have been able to. A mighty warrior didn't struggle to harness his birthright, his power – power that, as Ras said, should have come naturally to him. Should have. For some oddity in the universe decreed that Jay Walker was not capable of reclaiming the element that he was sure had once been his. Well, that wasn't entirely wrong. He was capable of it, certainly, but it took focus and meditation that he wouldn't be able to produce in a real fight.
That, he knew from experience.
The past few weeks, after hours of grueling target practice and endurance training and whatnot, Ras would demand Jay spar with him. So far, all he'd gotten out of it was several bloody noses, many, many bruises, and the understanding that he wasn't capable of doing what he should. Ras never pulled his punches – or kicks, for that, and Jay thanked all the higher powers that they weren't using weapons – and it was all he could do to avoid them. He wanted to believe that it was the product of his training, or his muscle memory carrying him forth, and to some extent it likely was; for the most part, he just assumed it was his incredible high adrenaline and desire to not break any bones or die.
Case in point:
“Guh,” Jay groaned as he was thrown backwards into the walls of their training field. “Shit.”
He had barely a moment before Ras came back at him, swinging – he barely ducked away from a punch that would've shattered his skull, or something. Ras was inhumanly strong like that.
He rolled out of the way of a kick, scrambling away in a mad dash to put some distance between him and Ras to catch his breath, maybe, or at least be able to collect himself. Summoning his lighting wasn't even in the equation.
He came to his knees a few feet from Ras, breathing heavily.
It wasn't far enough.
A fist caught him clean in the stomach, sending him tumbling away, gasping and heaving with the need to catch his breath – or maybe expel the contents of his stomach. That hurt. Man, that hurt.
It was always like this, when the sparring sessions began to drag on. Ras wasn't one to stop when Jay started to tire, so they would keep going until Jay had physically collapsed, and if he was still conscious Ras might have given him a hit or two anyway. At some point, Jay had to begin wondering if he was being trained at all, or if he was just being used as a punching bag to vent frustrations. They had been sparring for maybe five minutes, this time – which sounded incredibly pathetic, and maybe it was – but he had been training the entire day before that. His core pulsed with that same crackling feeling, and he tried his best to grasp it with bruised, shaking fingers. It slipped through, again and again, like water, and by then Ras was barrelling toward him with clenched fists and Jay had to move yesterday.
Cinder was watching, as he did sometimes, when Ras ordered him off the field so they could use the space he was previously occupying. He never failed to look upset about it, which made Jay feel a little guilty – he didn't understand, however, why, exactly, Cinder didn't want to take a break. He glanced them over with a critical eye, analysing their movements, drawing conclusions he would never share. Not to Jay, anyway. Who knows what he told Ras. Then again, Ras didn't seem to be the kind of guy to accept help or criticism. He was the one training Jay, even so; Jay couldn't help but wonder if he would turn out that way one day. If Ras had been his comrade or his leader, maybe he already had been.
Jay grunted, a sound that sounded more like a pained yelp, when Ras sent a punch his way that barely glanced off the already bruising forearm Jay had used to deflect his blow. It throbbed with pain, but he didn't have time to do anything about it, let alone come up with an idea to get out of close quarters combat. Ras struck, again and again, and Jay was managing just barely enough to not suffer serious injury – he couldn't think about how to get away from Ras, not when all his energy was spent trying not to die.
He slipped up, just once, letting his stance wobble just slightly as his foot caught on a loose stone, but it was enough. Ras caught him in the face, sparking a white hot burst of pain dead centre.
Something dripped, uncomfortably warm, down his lip. He tasted salt. Shit. He was bleeding, again. His nose didn't feel broken, even though it hurt like hell. He assumed everything was in the right place, anyway. He didn't look into the mirror much these days. He hadn't cut his hair in a while, not since about a month before his escape from the Administration, and it had grown long enough to tuck behind his ears just barely. It was strange to look in the mirror. He tried not to. It usually inspired a feeling of deja vu he couldn't shake.
Ras growled lowly, snapping Jay from his thoughts. “You have not improved. Your Lightning is weak and inaccessible.”
“My hand-to-hand has,” Jay protested weakly, gritting his teeth with shame when Ras scoffs.
“Bah. A man of your calibre should be able to hold your own with no effort. Not anymore, apparently.”
Jay looked away. “That's not… not my fault.”
“That doesn't matter. Strength is all that matters in this world. If you aren't strong, you're weak.”
He paused, turning a cold glare to Jay's generally pathetic figure. “I don't care what amnesiac affliction you have. You get a handle on your Lightning quick, or next time we spar I won't stop at first blood.”
Shit. Shit. Fuck. This was so bad. Distantly, he felt himself nod through the light-headedness. Shit. Light-headedness. Lighting, quick. He couldn't muster the amusement required to laugh at his own shitty jokes. He was so done for. Ras was going to beat him to death, and he would never be able to recover his memories of – nothing, probably, because nobody could have really given a shit about him in the past at all if this was where he had ended up, with a bunch of cultist Wolf Clan weirdos and a master that beat him to hell every day in the name of training for a fight he didn't know anything about. He couldn't master his Lightning in what, a day? Two, if Ras was feeling lenient, which he never was. A day, then. A day to prevent his death by mastering something he hadn't been able to for the approximate five years he'd been alive. Shit.
Someone was kneeling next to him.
“Tough luck, man.” Cinder.
It was always Cinder, after each awful training session. They'd made a habit of idle chatter after their sessions, occasionally joined by a reluctant, snappy Jordana – Cinder had told him, with a lot of humour, that she spent most of her time studying forbidden magic and practicing it. At least she had a power she could get a handle on. Their conversation was nice, sometimes, even if they didn't have much in common except for the obvious, like Ras and their status as elemental masters. Even that was different, actually. Cinder had skill, he had experience; Jay had nothing. Five years of a dead end office job.
Another thing he'd learned about Cinder: he never had much sympathy. He shrugged and joked in an apathetic – sometimes antipathetic, mocking – way, and told Jay to expect worse to be coming. It wasn't very helpful, no, and it wasn't motivational, either. He thinks Cinder might just get a kick out of causing him anxiety. It's the closest thing he has to a friendship, right now, so he takes it. And isn't that pathetic?
“Understatement of the century.”
Cinder smiles in that way Jay has begun to recognise as – not sympathy, but something more amused: the expression one has when faced with a wet, pathetic, mewling cat. The closest thing he could manage to being genuine.
“It gets—”
“ —Worse, I know,” Jay groaned.
A pause. “I was going to say easier, actually.”
Wow. Cinder? Being encouraging? Not well, never, but making what seemed to be an attempt? That was strange. And weird. And every other synonym possible. “Does it? Really?”
And his nose was still bleeding, which made things a lot more awkward. For him, not Cinder. He didn't think that man could be awkward at all.
“I mean, yeah. You get used to it, I guess.”
Jay mumbled something in response. He didn't think it over thoroughly, and it left his memory as soon as the words left his lips. Fleeting, like his memory, like his life before the Merge, like all the bluffs he swapped with Cinder.
They sat in silence – or rather, Cinder let Jay stew in his silence, before he cut into it with his typically sharp voice. “Ras said you had amnesia.”
Jay scowled. That was venturing into much more vulnerable territory, and it wasn't territory he wanted to explore with Cinder. He began to shake his head, before pausing; Cinder didn't seem the type to just leave things alone, more likely than not to poke and prod at him.
He was too slow in making any relevant decision, like he always was nowadays. Cinder noticed. “If you're so insistent on being moody, I can offer you a trade.”
Jay winced. “No ‘get out of jail free’ card?”
“Nah. Take it or leave it.”
“I could just… not tell you.”
“That's basically confirmation.”
Jay clicked his tongue. Drats. Busted, he supposed. “I have amnesia,” He began hesitantly. “I don't remember anything from before the Administration, before… the Merge too, I guess.”
Cinder whistled lowly. “That's some story to tell. Tough shit, man.”
“Tell me your thing, now.”
“My thing,” Cinder retorted, grinning like he'd successfully stolen candy from a baby. “I never said anything about that.”
Jay gaped at him. “Trade,” he mustered. “One-for-one – you said—”
“I said trade. Didn't set any requirements.”
Jay flopped back onto the floor, releasing his hand from where it had clamped over his nose in an effort to clog the bleeding. It had stopped, anyway. Mostly. A stray few drops tipped back into his nose and blocked his airways off.
“You're a dick,” Jay mumbled through his inability to breathe properly. “You know that?”
Cinder grinned at him, face upside down. “Shatterspin, man. Does wonders for your empathy and morality.”
He scrunched his face up. “What the hell is that?”
“Spinjitsu, but better.”
“Great. Explains a lot.”
Cinder laughed. “You don't know much, do you?”
“No, man, I've had amnesia the past five years.”
“It's been five years,” he deadpanned.
“Five years spent at a dead-end office job.”
“Look, man,” Cinder sighs. “Let's be honest – you're pathetic. You suck at all this elemental bullshit and you haven't landed a single hit on Ras, let alone… anyone, probably.”
Ouch. Not entirely untrue, which is worse. Jay sits up and decides to kill two birds with one stone; unblock his nose and make eye-contact with Cinder.
“But you're also the most entertaining person here to talk to, and I don't want you to get beaten to shit. It helps that your spars give me a break from training.”
And was Jay delusional, or was that affection? As close to it as Cinder could manage, of course, but something akin to it, anyway. It was spun in such a way that put the focus on him and not Jay, which was fair. Nobody in this clan wasn't self-serving, he'd wager.
He didn't answer. He didn't think he should have, lest he dissuaded the other man from whatever reflective, affectionate bender he was on. So he swallowed his words and made peace with shutting up.
Cinder seemed to debate for a long moment, as if contemplating whether kindness was something he was really going to expend his breath on. It worked, in the end. He took a deep breath.
“Your true potential,” he blurts.
Jay blinked. “My what?”
“Your true potential. You said the other day that you had this – like, weird… crackling energy. That's the rest of your power.”
“The rest? I – Uh?”
He groaned. Jay felt a little stupid, but when didn't he? “You – don't make me be nice over this. First Spinjitzu Master, this is dumb. Your true potential is. Well, the extent of what you can do. Your true capability at the moment, the power that you can't access right now.”
“Okay,” Jay said, despite barely understanding the explanation. His power that he didn't have right now but was in him and could have in the future but also right now. Cool. Cool cool cool. “And how do I.. uhm, unlock it?”
Cinder looked frustrated. “It's like, eugh – emotional. Or mental. Or something. You gotta overcome your trauma, man.”
Jay shook his head. “Dude, I've had amnesia for five years. I don't know what kind of trauma you think I have.”
“Not trauma trauma, like – like… Your emotional blockage? The thing that's subconsciously keeping you from using your power.”
“Oh.”
Now he looked relieved. “Yeah. It's weird that you can feel it, though. You probably unlocked it in your previous life or something. As in before the Merge. Your mind knows it's there, you've just acquired another blockage from your… amnesia, or something.”
“Oh,” he said again.
Cinder's eye twitched. “Good. Shit, this has been way too much kindness for one day. I'm leaving.”
So he did.
And Jay… Jay didn't know what to say to that. Something had upturned between the two of them, for sure. Cinder had just given him advice. Advice! From Cinder! And it sounded genuinely helpful. Speaking of that advice, Jay had to put it into practice now. As in, Right Now. Ras was going to beat his ass if he didn't.
And then he thought of the next issue: he had no idea how to do that.
__________
Jay ended up retreating to his room. He always did, nowadays – it was the one place nobody deigned to enter, the one place that felt… private, really, since his arrival. Not so much at the Wolf Clan, but more so his entire life, which was a pathetic stint of five years. At the Administration, people knew him on a surface level, vapidly, but everyone did. They spoke about him, him in his position of power, and they gossiped. It wasn't exactly uncomfortable, but it wasn't the opposite, either. It just was something that was. People will always talk: that was what the Administrator had told him when he'd mentioned it in passing. People would always talk, people would always misunderstand, and people would always use. It was a generally pessimistic viewpoint that was as bitter as it was pathetic, Jay thought after everything had gone down with the Administration; at the time, he had been thoroughly enthralled, like a small child that had learnt the world could be more than positivity. In hindsight, he was more of an edgy teenager who had grabbed onto the first phrase that could encapsulate basically how he had felt and hadn't let go.
Jay had decided he was, would be more than that – more than the gossip, the thin veneer of Agent Walker, the Manager – so he left. But he hadn't, really. He was in the same place, in a different time, with different people.
People talk, people misunderstand, people use. Jay would have himself believe he was the one using Ras, using Cinder, using Jordana. They were stepping stones at best on his route to power, control, direction. People use, and Jay was a person. Of course, he was under no impression that they weren't using him too. They needed his power for whatever Tournament they wanted him to enter. Maybe Cinder and Jordana less so – they too were pawns in Ras’ game. They were using him nonetheless, for their own separate reasons. Cinder wanted levity, entertainment. Jordana… he didn't know if she cared about him enough to want to use him at all.
Of course, all of this would imply he was worth being used – he, who had never succeeded at wielding his power since the day he'd arrived. That was another matter entirely. But they thought he was, and for now…for now it would be enough.
Somebody stepped past his door, footsteps echoing through the crackling between it and the floor. The sound startled him from his thinking, and Jay moved away from it and towards the centre of his room. The room in question was bare – decorated with the barest necessities like a table and a bed and a closet that wasn't even filled a quarter of the way, because there hadn't exactly been time to shop for his aesthetics before he was put to training. If he had had the time, he didn't think he would have, anyway. Back at the Administration, he had, with his less than appropriate pay. He'd thought decorating his cubicle and his apartment would make his life less of a capitalistic hell and more of a gilded cell he could live with. It just made him feel more like a loser, so he'd quit. His room back at the apartment complex was probably cleared out by now, replaced by some other poor worker who struggled to make ends meet and bought himself the stupidest items to liven up a place that was long dead. Jay wished them the best.
Jay sat down at his desk, pressing his palms against one another. Time to do some soul searching.
To be entirely, unfilteringly honest, Jay had no emotional roadblocks. Or at least he thought he didn't. If he were to visit a psychiatrist, like that Administration shrink that did nothing but tell him to work harder, he could probably discover at least twenty-five things that made him unproductive, defective, and generally problematic – but here? Alone in a room that felt more like a holding cell, and wasn't that a mirroring comparison, he had nothing.
It rang truer than he'd expected it to, for a sentence that bubbled to the surface of his mind in less than a second and one he'd expected to fade just as fast, as most things tended to in his messy brain. He really had nothing didn't he? It was why he desired so much, why he was okay with being used like this. He had nothing to lose.
He wanted direction because he didn't know where to go, what to do, and he didn't have enough power to choose for himself – he wanted power because he didn't have enough of it to take control of his own life, and he wanted control because he had never had enough of it to choose a direction for himself. It really all came full circle, didn't it?
He had nothing, because he started with nothing. No personality, no background, no nothing. Jay Walker had had nothing but a name that meant nothing with no memories, and now? Now he had no say, now he had no power, still – now he had nothing, still. Ras had promised him something, something to help him carry on, something to give him purpose.
His unexplained Tournament of Sources was vague and undefined. His training was brutal, and felt so unimaginably pointless. His relationships were the same they always were, useless, useless. He didn't mean enough to anyone to trust them to save him from his hell of nothingness, and they didn't mean enough to him for him to begin trying to. He had ties that were flimsy and thin, but ties tied tightly enough that they would follow him wherever he went. The Wolf Clan had a reputation. There was nowhere for him to go.
Jay scoffed bitterly. Nowhere but here.
You couldn't make something out of nothing, could you?
He closed his eyes. Reached inwards, again.
He'd forgotten, for a moment.
He had this. His Lightning. It was the singular tie to his past, one short phrase said in passing that contained an ocean's worth of information.
“You probably unlocked it in your previous life..”
And would you look at that? For the first time in five years, Jay had something. His power, which lay dormant, but was not gone, not gone like his memories and his fleeting moments of deja vu. His power, power that spoke of a need for it, which meant a warrior – Jay, a warrior. His power, that he needed. The power that he needed more than ever.
His fingers sparked, almost invisibly. For the first time in five years, Jay Walker knew what he wanted.
And what he wanted was to stop being this. Pathetic, pointless, powerless. He wanted to make something of himself, whether it be what he used to be or something entirely new.
Maybe he hadn't been left with nothing. Maybe the Merge hadn't taken everything from him – it was true that his power was a part of him, inseparably, but he had been too, and now he had lost it. But he had his power, or he could, and that was more than enough. With his Lightning, he could drag himself back from the crevices he'd lost himself to, pull a personality back from the winding maze of offices he'd lost them in, pull his purpose back from the weeks of escape that had left him with nothing but a desire for more.
He had changed, almost in his entirety, but not quite – no. As long as he had this, his core, his power, his Lightning, he could build something new. Lightning was energy, in the end. It was power in the most literal sense; it was the electricity that ran through his brain and the guns he used to use and the veins throughout his body. Jay clenched his fists, watching them spark with yellow electricity that arced in between his closed fingers and jumped through his skin like dolphins from waves.
Lightning was him. Jay was Lightning, at his core. And as long as he was, he could continue to exist as Jay Walker. Lose his memories, lose his direction, lose power, that he could do – but he could never let this go.
His fists sparked one last time, pulsing juxtaposingly with energy, and then he exploded with light.
Light-ning. Ha.
When Jay opened his eyes – or maybe he hadn't closed them, and his vision had just finally cleared from watching what was essentially a flash bomb detonate before his eyes, he nearly closed them all over again. He was Lightning now, literally. His fingers glowed, translucent, a bright yellow that had blue, vein-like streaks of lightning flashing through him where his bones would be. It changed and flickered, never truly staying the same, never reverting to the exact position it once was in – just like Jay himself.
He felt lighter, too. Free. Like he could as easily bring about a thunderstorm as jump into the nearest telephone cable – hypothetically, because there were no cables around for… miles, probably – and follow his element to wherever it took him. Jay felt a smile, borderline hysterical in its overwhelming elation, bloom across his face. It was invigorating.
This was his true potential.
…Huh. Cinder had been right about that emotional block. Just took finding his personal, stationary truth to unlock his hidden, video-game-esque power boost. Wasn't that funny? He'd always assumed training would be the answer. Instead, he had sat down alone and internally reflected on himself.
It felt like something from a movie, or a cartoon. Solved with the power of self-responsibility and developing a real sense of worth! Joy! Yay!
Abruptly, he started to laugh. Loud, high-pitched peals of laughter – giggles, really – that blew away the remains of his briefly deprecating stint.
He was Jay Walker, and Jay Walker was Lightning itself.
__________
“You look confident,” Cinder deadpanned. Jordana was there, for the first time in a few days. She looked intrigued. Cinder had probably told her that she would get to either witness Ras beating Jay bloodier than normal, or get to see Jay whip out a level of power he so far hadn't displayed. Jay didn't know which would happen either. After he had laughed himself to tears alone in a bare bedroom – which he was a little embarrassed of, now – he had crackled his fingers with electricity a few times, just to check if he could still do it (he could) half-assedly, and gone to bed.
He didn't want to spoil the surprise, so he smiled tight-lippedly and wiggled his fingers at them. Definitely a more silly thing than he'd normally do, but he felt like he deserved a pinch of whimsicality after the astoundingly bad five years he'd had without his powers.
Speaking of his Lightning: he felt better than ever. It was like he could run miles without breaking a sweat, like he could do it at a much faster speed, too. His body felt lighter, more energised, even after a day of training. How had he ever lived without this? It was seriously amazing.
Soon, Ras stepped out into the courtyard as well, raising an eyebrow at Jay's obvious confidence. “Are you ready?”
Jay nodded. Without another moment to spare, he ducked out of the way of a hard left hook, trying his best to return the hit with his own left fist. Ras caught it easily, holding it to keep Jay in place before gutting his hard with his other elbow.
“Ugh–!” Jay sparked his fingers, forcing Ras to let go of his fist with a spasm in his hand. He fell back, past the breathlessness that came with a hard hit to the gut, and stumbled back to give himself space. Ras didn't follow, looking contemplatively at his still twitching fingers.
He turned to look at Jay, raising his eyebrow.
And then he rushed at him, claws outstretched.
“Shit!” Jay yelped, dodging out of the way of a wide swing. He continued, and it was surprisingly easy. With his power had come his confidence, and with that came his instincts. Combined with his enhanced speed, fighting Ras was easier than ever before. Relatively, of course.
Ras stabbed at him with his right hand outstretched, claws glinting in the sunlight. It wasn't careless enough to leave Jay an opening to get his fist through, but he didn't need it. He had his Lightning. Jay wasn't stupid – he knew it was intentional, that Ras was testing Jay, and that he wasn't truly open – but he took the opportunity, sending a jolt of electricity through the opening to strike him in the side.
Ras avoided it, claws swatting the bolt out of the way to crash against the far wall, leaping away from Jay to pause. He turned a more considering eye onto him, and for the first time, it felt a little approving.
Jay, emboldened, was the one who attacked first. They exchanged blows, more Ras than Jay, because despite his muscle memory he had too little raw strength to match Ras’ sheer power in close combat, but he held his own far better than he used to. They sparred – and felt like genuine sparring, like they were… not equals, but something close, like commander and subordinate. The more time passed, the more Jay grew convinced that Ras had been telling the truth about their previous connections. Briefly, he wondered if it was painful for Ras to see him this way, alone, angry, amnesiac. It was short and fleeting, but it was enough to make his still newly awakened Lightning to flicker and die for just a moment. Ras saw the opportunity with a keen eye, and took it.
It ended with a swipe of Ras's claws drawing a long but shallow cut along the side of Jay's cheek, from his jaw to nearly cutting the junction between his nose and eye. He flinched, not hard – but enough to give Ras a larger upper hand. He was tossed back unceremoniously, rolling to a stop not far from Cinder and Jordana. He wasn't facing them, but he could feel their eyes on him. It didn't feel judgemental, but it didn't feel nearly like praise. Something in between, like consideration.
Ras grunted, retracting his claws. Oh, good. Jay almost thought he was going to carry on like he said he would.
“Take the day off tomorrow. After that, we train your Shatterspin.”
What.
Ras? Giving him a break?
Practically unheard of.
To add the cherry, sprinkles, and whipped cream, his tone wasn't angry, like it usually was. Gruff, yes, but when wasn't he? If Jay didn't know better, he would have thought it was almost proud, or at least approving. Even if it wasn't, it was close enough.
He realised Ras was still waiting, expecting an answer.
“Uh,” Jay hurriedly added, “yes.”
Cinder nudged him with his foot. He hadn't realised he'd gotten so close.
“I mean, yes, L-Lord Ras!”
Cinder's foot left his bruised side. Ras left without another word.
“So,” Jordana said. “He improves.”
Jay turned his body to face them, stumbling to his feet, just in time to watch her glance meaningfully at Cinder. It was kind of wild, how his dexterity left him the moment the adrenaline filled moment passed.
He raised an eyebrow back at her, mumbling something like, “whatever.”
“Yeah, I did,” Jay grinned. He felt genuinely proud of himself, which is an achievement he didn’t remember having ever felt before. The closest would have probably been his escape from the Administration, but there had been too much euphoric freedom at the time to really notice. And panic. Couldn't forget the copious amount of panicking he did.
“He's going to teach you shatterspin,” Cinder said. “We're gonna have to train together from now on.”
Jay nodded at him, smiling, not missing the smug look he directed at Jordana.
“I'll be doing more important things, like studying my magic,” she retorted without looking at him.
“Reading.”
“Just because you're illiterate, Cinder, doesn't mean we all are.”
“Let's not bicker,” Jay poked in meekly.
She looked back at him and sighed, but there was the barest hint of a smile on her lips. “You're right, I suppose. We're all Lord Ras’ pawns. Gotta stick together.”
She let Jay wallow in the strange self-awareness of that statement for a few moments, before she cut back in. “Shatterspin shatters your goodness, by the way.”
Oh.
“Oh. Really?” Jay frowned.
“Yeah,” Cindner shrugs. “But if you're here, you probably don't have any goodness to lose.”
Something about that was grossly untrue – maybe about Jay himself, or maybe about all of them, because they've been the ones to show him the most kindness – the most goodness, since he'd got here. Granted, it wasn't excessive, nor was it even a normal, healthy amount, but it was far more than he'd expected at all.
“I think everyone's got a bit of goodness in them,” Jay said mysteriously. He thought it was true, and even if it wasn't, and he truly lost all of his goodness practicing it, he had his Lightning. As long as he had that, he was still Jay Walker.
Cinder smiled the way he would at a piteously optimistic small child, but he let the words go unpunished.
“Whatever helps you sleep at night,” Jordana said in his stead.
Even so, as they turned to head inwards to find dinner, they left a gap between them for Jay to slip into. He had his Lightning, he had his identity, and maybe he could find friends here too. Not family, no – although he'd lost hope that that was elsewhere, he didn't feel quite ready to accept the Wolf Clan as that, yet. For now, friends would do.
Friends were easier here anyway. And Cinder and Jordana were beginning to feel like just that.