Claire pointed at the sketch.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIr77WismBa
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.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2EAziqNW7w
Sure, she’d just seen him “yesterday,” but that was only true for her. Not for them.
They didn’t remember yesterday.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3KYjd5Af6n
She was the only one who did.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWH5pLkDJ0l
Again.
22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwNYZHhSqfC
One hour ago
22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCxsViA7uIh
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?”22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyXcFGET2NB
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.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡcQEXOPF1Iz
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.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCWRG2LcV3F
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.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVFhrgGyv4Q
Standing still with eyes shut and faces to the sky.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4ZRtiPV17s
It looked like some weird silent ritual.
And honestly?22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡn6CJxbtIuu
Kinda hilarious.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMg4eZ7m7ku
But Claire couldn’t even smile.
Her fists were clenched, palms sweaty.
A few seconds passed.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1iVI7q3GWc
Then they opened their eyes and shook their heads.
“Nothing.”
Her stomach dropped.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLgStRYSlZA
Not disappointment—22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCe1LPZkIbE
More like that awful sensation when the last thread holding you to reality starts to snap.
“Please,” she said, softly.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3z39F68IV4
“Tell Batman. I need help.”
Her voice was nearly emotionless.
22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡapoygY6pnq
By the time Batman arrived, Claire looked like someone who’d just walked out of a morgue.
Pale. Hollow.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRQok9k53SU
As if the inside of her brain had been scrubbed raw.
She spoke without inflection. No energy for theatrics.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPxKnH5pHgd
Just repeated the same thing.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCnkI0Rm6e5
Over. And over.
She’d already said it yesterday.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMBKDM2J2EL
She was saying it again today.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwA00Ua7iw4
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?22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSgHxWORKc5
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.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgsH6b8utHR
Hearts on Valentine’s. Pumpkins in October.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ54As0sN7Mp
Nothing too serious. Just scribbles for customers when business was slow.
She took a deep breath.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzNn5yXZLzA
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.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgNok3LHsXm
But it was exact.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡdnjXuabHD4
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.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ74HSOf6r7y
All three stared.
Three different faces.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwJnsdp4npB
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.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWX4T9Xh1bc
The kind of serious that said:
If you tell me I made this up, I’m going to lose it. For real.
22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8JI2cfdiSf
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.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2NFgIzVrWE
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?”22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRmm3tKEg4M
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.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡd6luvXd3hT
22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKvpUBM71dv
Claire tried to recall, but her usual nighttime habits got in the way.
She had always avoided going out at night—almost like instinct.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡC6ro4L8CK8
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.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡXJjhhBMPNp
Here she was, explaining some urban-legend-tier nonsense to Batman. With zero proof.
“Do you get headaches? Hear voices?”22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0HK26xcojy
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.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfRyVPdMIMw
That wasn’t disbelief—it was a quiet, anxious kind of urgency. A desire to help, not dismiss.
Claire shook her head.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡphLV8Jfqm2
Hard.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ9xRkuV5znY
Like shaking would erase every lingering “are you just crazy?” that might be forming in their minds.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡx8oXqlPekY
She was tired of being questioned. Hell, she was already questioning herself.
“Why only her?”22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzmRoASJ4Ev
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.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3XVtuK4WDx
His cape shifted slightly, like it was hiding the fact that even he didn’t feel so steady anymore.
He didn’t speak.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2TzpVC6IkF
And somehow that silence was worse.
Claire felt it like a chill under the skin. A subtle, creeping sense of dread.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTXD9GHlh0d
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.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmxISCliR7o
It wasn’t comfort. It wasn’t analysis.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡru5gsKjzBC
It was a warning.
Then he looked at Claire.
And in that moment, his gaze wasn’t warm, or even human.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOX9zjjaWBR
It was clinical.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqcrpYMAkng
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.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCzAIRoYJcL
No.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8gL7GcN24G
This wasn’t just her seeing the rift.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhLMuxagrrk
The rift… had seen her.
and then Add to home screen.