With the Shadow Line defeated, the ToQgers are finally able to go back to being children. Their families welcome them back as if nothing has happened, blissfully ignorant of the battles that have been fought for them.
Most things go back to the way they were before, but a few things have changed. For one thing, the five of them retain their memories of being ToQgers and (sort of) adults. For another, Right now has a shadow for a roommate.
Right has settled Zett in his closet, hidden in the back behind hanging clothes and carefully reorganized boxes. Right has done his best to make him comfortable, pilfering spare blankets from the linen closet downstairs and throw pillows from chairs and couches around the house.
Zett's night vision extraordinary, better than any other shadow, Zett tells Right proudly. Apparently he can see just fine with the closet door closed, but Right finds the little battery powered lantern his grandpa gave him for camping, and suspends it along the back wall with system of string and paper clips that is perhaps not as neat as Right had imagined it would be, but holds together just fine. Zett snorts at Right while he is putting it up and tries to back-seat build, but Right is confident in his plan. Zett doesn't look too impressed with the final product, but his eyes go wide and when Right flips the soft orange glow on, Zett actually looks pretty impressed.
Zett says he doesn't like it in the closet, grumbling about it being unfit for the Emperor of Darkness in a way that strongly reminds Right of something Morq would have said. Right tells him it's not for forever, just until he's better. He carefully doesn't say "when you're strong enough to go out" because he knows that the shadow will take it was a challenge. The strange sunburn rash fades, and Zett is really doing much better than he was when Right first brought him home, but he can't really can't afford to waste what little reserves he has just to go collapse in front of one of Right's windows or something. The imperious glares Zett levels at him are greatly diminished by his creased clothes and staticky hair.
Really though, Right thinks Zett doesn't mind so much. He is still very weak, and he naps a lot. The closet is warm and safe and Right wonders how long it has been since Zett had a quiet place he could rest in without anybody bothering him. Having met Morq and the rest of Zett's shadow line retainers, he suspects it's been a while. Right has often enough peaked into the closet to find Zett curled up like a large house cat in his nest of soft things, cloak half covering his body. The cloak has stopped disintegrating, and though the hem remains ragged, the fabric has regained its cohesion and is not longer fragile and ancient seeming. The texture around the edges is still a little dusty, though Right suspects that may be from actually being in the back of a dusty closet all the time.