I'm really not happy with this chapter but I have no idea how to actually make it semi-decent so here you go anyway.

Jasper, Charlotte and Schwoz stood around the man cave frozen like statues. None of them knew what to do.

"I guess this means that we do not have to worry about Angel anymore." Schwoz was the first person to break the silence. His voice was calm and steady yet his expression told a different story.

Charlotte flicked through TV channels, searching the news for more information. Every channel said the exact same thing: Captain Man had killed Angel.

"I mean, they can't hurt us or anyone else anymore.." Charlotte's mumble trailed into nothing as she nervously dug her teeth into the skin surrounding her fingernails and pulled, causing a small pool of blood to appear in the raw skin. Her fingernails had become stumps in the minutes since Ray's return. Concern, fear, dread and relief thickened the air, suffocating the trio inside.

"Ray still killed someone." Jasper's words hit Charlotte like a blade.

"Oh my God Ray, what have you done?" Burying her face into her hands, she fell onto the sofa and grimaced.

"Should we go and talk to him?" Schwoz's eyes trailed to the gear door before locking with Jasper's.

"I don't know. He might want to be alone right now." He ran his hands through his hair only for it to become caught in tiny knots that had taken residence in the strands.

Charlotte's eyes suddenly lit up as an idea hit her and she pulled her phone out of her pocket. The expression her face held became increasingly darker the longer she stared at the screen. "It's trending. The reactions are pretty mixed but oh god the negative ones are BAD."

"Why didn't he just arrest Angel like he normally would have?" Jasper knew the answer but he spoke anyway while his hands anxiously pulled apart the knots that sat in his hair.

"He just lost control. I would have done the same thing if I were him." All of a sudden, Charlotte let out a deep sigh and stormed upwards. "I can't just sit here and leave him like this. I'm gonna go check on him."

Schwoz stared at her as if she was insane.

"Are you really sure? Ray is scary when he is in a bad mood."

"I'll come too." Jasper announced though he was quickly shot down by Charlotte.

"It might be overwhelming for him right now if we're both there. Just wait here, I won't be long." With that she left, feigning bravery as she passed through the sliding gear door.

"He is a dummy." The balding man announced as soon as the two were left alone.

"I hope he's okay..." Jasper muttered under his breath.

"Ah he will be fine." Schwoz waved his hand as he spoke, his confidant voice still contradicting the anxious mess his face painted. Even if he wouldn't show it Schwoz was worried. The pair sat in silence until Charlotte returned, neither really waning to make small talk in a time like.

A few minutes later Charlotte entered from behind the gear. Jasper and Schwoz's heads turned to face her immediately, both men eager to find out how Ray was.

"Alright, I convinced him to go and shower. He's about to now. That should give him something to do for a bit." She announced as she entered, wearing a solemn look on her face as she spoke.

"How is he?" Jasper rushed towards Charlotte, not bothering to even slightly mask his concern.

"Bad. He's really shaken up."

Jasper nodded gently in understanding before his eyes lit up. An idea had formed in his head. "Ray has headphones that he uses to meditate when he gets stressed, right? The wireless ones? We should find them, they might help calm him down a little."

The trio searched, turning up every part of the Man cave in the process. As they were in the process of rummaging through a hidden cupboard their search was interrupted, however. A sudden bang resounded throughout the room, echoing slightly in the space.

Without saying a word to each other they charged towards the bathroom to find Ray collapsed on the shower floor.

"Wait Charlotte he's nak-" Jasper's words were cut short by Charlotte's dry tone.

"Boy, I really don't care right now. Just help me get him up."

She pushed past Jasper, grasped onto Ray's arm and attempted to pull him up though her body was far too weak to lift him by herself. For a moment Jasper just stared, his brain not fully registering the situation, then he clung onto the man's other arm and together the pair half-dragged half-carried him towards his room and heaved him up onto his bed. Ray just lay there, trembling and hugging his body desperately.

"Alright there you go." Jasper muttered under his breath in a comforting manner while he pulled the covers over the man.

Slowly he calmed down, his erratic breathing turning into slow deep breaths while he stared blankly at the ceiling above him with glossy eyes.

"Are you okay, Ray?" Schwoz perched himself on the end of Ray's bed and poked the man lightly yet Ray did nothing.

Charlotte and Jasper shared a concerned glance at the lack of response.

"What should we do?" Jasper looked over his shoulder at the man as he spoke.

"I guess we just have to leave him." She dug her teeth lightly into her bottom lip for a moment before continuing. "He probably just needs some time to think. Any sane person would be like this after going through that."

"I hope so. I could stay here and keep an eye on him, I probably won't sleep much anyway." Jasper found himself surprised at the lengths he would go to protect Ray. Even now that he no longer worshiped Ray like he used to he still went out of his way to make the man happy. Ray was vulnerable and it scared Jasper.

"Go and try to sleep, you haven't slept properly in ages. Schwoz and I will take turns to check on him, won't we Schwoz?"

"Aah but I'm tiirreedd" Schwoz groaned. However, a murderous glare sent his way by Charlotte caused him to nervously nod his head in agreement.

Reluctantly, Jasper accepted the plan and after lightly patting his boss on the shoulder, he headed to bed. That night he didn't sleep at all, though. How could he have slept with what had just happened?

xxx

A gentle knock on his bedroom door snapped Jasper out of his semi-conscious dazed state the next morning.

"Jasper? Are you awake?" A faint voice could be heard from behind the door, the voice belonging to none other than Charlotte.

"Yeah, come in." Jasper sat up and watched as a blinding light pooled into the room.

Charlotte emerged from its rays, fully dressed complete with a thick coat and a large backpack swung over one shoulder.

"Why are you so dressed up?" He questioned, cocking his head slightly as his eyes met her attire.

"Schwoz and I have go out. I was just letting you know."

"Really? Right now?" The previous nights events replayed throughout Jasper's mind, causing him to stare at Charlotte in disbelief. They were really leaving Ray when he needed them the most? Guilt filled Charlotte's expression, causing her to stare at the carpet.

"I know, it's terrible timing I'm so sorry. We won't have this chance again though, it's super urgent." She shifted uncomfortably in her spot while sending an apologetic look towards Jasper, who let out a deep sigh and nodded his head gently.

"Alright, it's fine. Just when will you guys be back?"

"Late tonight at the very latest. I'll text you when we're in Swellview again."

"Charlotte, hurry up we will be late!" Schwoz's yell could be faintly heard from the main room, the sound causing Charlotte to jump slightly.

"I'm sorry Jasper, seriously. I'll see you later, bye dude." She called as she ran out of the room, leaving Jasper alone.

He ran his hands through his hair and glanced at the clock on his bedside table which announced it was 5:54am. After deciding that it was too late to go back to bed, he got up, got dressed and checked on Ray.

The man lay curled up in a ball in deep sleep. While his face nuzzled into the blanket gave him a peaceful appearance, the twitching of his hands announced that his sleep was being plagued by nightmares. Still, Jasper smiled gently at the sight- At least he was asleep in the first place. Wireless headphones sat on Ray's head, the sound of meditation music leaking from them gently. Jasper stared at Ray for a moment before turning to leave. His footsteps were silent even if he knew the man wouldn't be able to hear them. Jasper really didn't want to bring the sleeping man back to reality.

The rest of the day was spent killing time aimlessly, each hour of the day dragged into one strange infinity as he waited for a text from Charlotte. By 12pm a text still hadn't come and he felt the day merge into another as he sat and watched black and white reruns on the TV. At one point he vaguely remembered an emergency news broadcast about a bridge and a phone tower or something but his mind was too tired to properly acknowledge it.

The next day he did exactly the same, only getting up to eat, pee or check on Ray. Jasper found himself laughing at how little he could stand being alone throughout the day while worry ate him up at night. Horrific explanations for Charlotte and Schwoz's absence played through his mind, each one becoming more and more gruesome than the last. God, he was so worried.

On the third day his phone charger broke, sending him on a hunt throughout the Man Cave for one that fit his phone. Curse his obscure phone choice. He refused have a dead battery just in case he finally heard from Charlotte and Schwoz, resulting in him searching for about 4 hours before finally finding one in Schwoz's room under his bed along with 3 bottles of vodka and a 6 pack of beer. Being a 23 year old Jasper had drank before, though it had never really been his favourite activity and the fact that his friends apart from Schwoz didn't drink much meant he never felt pressured to do so. Still, the longer he stared at the drinks the more he found himself craving them. After losing an hour long battle of resistance, Jasper downed the Vodka and fell asleep on the sofa.

The fourth day began with an agonising headache and occasional vomiting which led to more alcohol. Jasper made the incredible discovery that that the autosnacker did much more than hotdogs and scrambled eggs, leading to even more alcohol. Feeling adventurous , Jasper also decided that it was the perfect day to curl his hair once again. The burns on his skin showed how well that went. The rest of the day was spent sleeping and lying in a drunken haze.

On the fith day Jasper decided to quit with the drinking and instead focused his energy on completing level 39 of Bucket warriors 2. The hangover was unbearable though and he ended up only getting through the day thanks to an unhealthy amount of paracetamol and just a teeny bit more alcohol.

Jasper spent the sixth day frantically worrying about Charlotte and Schwoz once again. For them to have said nothing in six days something must have been seriously wrong. Ray did nothing but stare into space in silence yet Jasper found himself refusing to leave the mans side all day. He needed human company.

A gentle electronic chirp woke Jasper, who had been fast asleep on Ray's floor, up on the seventh morning. Groggily he reached for his phone and checked the source of the notification only to drop it once the words registered in his brain.

"JASPER IM SORRY WE'RE ON OUR WAY NOW I'LL EXPLAIN AS SOON AS WE GET BACK." The all-caps message sent shock waves of relief through the receiver. Trickles of joy streamed down his face the longer he stared at the text.

"They're okay, they're okay. Thank God" Jasper mumbled under his breath in an attempt to comfort himself. He then found himself shaking Ray awake and telling him the news, to which the man only hummed gently and fell back asleep.

Jasper stood up and thanks to the newfound energy given to him by the text, he began to clean the Man cave while judging his previous actions in the process.

Once this was done he simply sat down and waited while he lazily stared at an old sitcom on TV.

xxx

The lift beeped slightly a few hours later, announcing that someone was there and causing Jasper to turn his head to greet the duo. What he did not expect, however, was to find Schwoz and five strangers being revealed by the sliding metal door. Schwoz stepped forward into the Man cave and after a slight delay, the others followed behind him completely in sync as if Schwoz was their leader. The strangers were dressed identically with each person wearing face masks over their mouths and silicone gloves on their hands.

"We will wait here for the others." Schwoz informed the group before turning to face Jasper innocently. "Hello!" He greeted as if the scene in front of them was completely normal.

For a moment Jasper just stared, his mouth hanging open slightly as he found himself frozen thanks to the absurdity of the situation. Eventually he worked up the ability to gingerly point a finger towards the people and let out a single word.

"...Why?" Before the shorter man could answer, however, another electronic ding revealed Charlotte with another batch of people.

"Alright go on, follow Schwoz." Charlotte shooed them away gently as she spoke.

"I will show you where we will set up and where you will stay." Schwoz's voice trailed off as he and the others moved away, leaving Charlotte and Jasper behind.

"Okay, what's going on here?" Disbelief coated Jasper's face as he pointed to the spot where the people once stood. Charlotte sighed deeply while collapsing into the sofa and beginning to explain.

"I guess I should start from the beginning."

As she spoke she fiddled with a curl of her hair, repeatedly twisting it around her finger over and over again as the words exited her mouth. "Okay so when Henry died we all just accepted that he was never coming back because you know, death?"

"Well yeah but I don't see what this has to do with-"

"Schwoz started thinking that we might be able to change that. He already knew how to bring a body back immediately from like drowning and all that but what if he could undo everything the poison did to Henry's body, undo all the effects of death like decay and start his body back up again?"

Charlotte inhaled deeply.

"Schwoz thinks he's found a way to do it. We're going to try and bring Henry back to life."

Jasper immediately froze as the words replayed through his brain. Henry. Alive. Gulping, he fought back tears that threatened to spill out of his eyes while his brain registered exactly what that would mean. Henry would be there again; his heart beating and chest breathing while thinking and talking and laughing and dreaming and looking and-

"I know it's a big thing. If you want to be alone for a moment it's totally fine." Charlotte's voice sent Jasper back to the present.

"No I'm fine just... Wow. You're actually going to do this." A large grin was plastered on his face as hope began flowing back into his world.

Charlotte smiled in response and continued. "He wasn't sure on some things so he asked me to help him but now we're pretty confident it's possible. That's why these people are here."

"Are they scientists and doctors and all that stuff?"

"Yeah. They're some of the best scientists, doctors and inventors we know and they're going to be staying in some of the spare rooms and working with us on the whole revival thing."

"This is insane." Jasper muttered under his breath. He couldn't believe this was actually happening in the first place, let alone so soon. Bringing someone back to life after this long was impossible, right? "Why didn't you tell me about this though? And why did you guys just disappear for a week? I was so so worried."

Charlotte tilted her head down to the ground for a second at Jasper's words before locking eyes with her friend.

"Look, I didn't tell you about this before now because wouldn't it be worse if I had told you about it and then we decided not to go through with it? It would be like giving you a brief glimmer of hope and then smashing it to pieces while kicking you in the face and stealing your wallet. It would suck." She moved her hand to his shoulder and squeezed it lightly. "At least now even if it doesn't work we still tried. It would still hurt but it would hurt a lot less." Jasper nodded gently in response as he began to understand Charlotte's actions. "And for the disappearing thing, didn't you hear? About the bridge and the phone tower?"

"What?" Jasper stared at the ceiling, trying to recall anything about it and then it hit him. "Oh I kind of remember a news thing about it but I don't remember what it actually said."

"Well we were over in Nevada to try and meet the scientists and one of them lives on this island in a pretty big lake near a phone tower. Somehow the tower knocked over, fell into the lake, destroyed the bridge to the island and killed most people in the lake through electrocution or being smashed by a phone tower."

"Holy shit."

"Yeah. We weren't hurt, just stuck on the island for a few days with no signal or WiFi. That's why we took so long."

"Do they know why it happened?"

"No. Apparently it was pretty sturdy though

so it's a bit weird that it collapsed."

Jasper hummed in response and began to think as all of the pieces of the past few months finally made sense. Scientists could be heard in the other room, their voices overlapping as they threw equipment around. For a while he just focused on the noise before a thought hit him. "Are you gonna tell Ray?" Jasper turned his head to face Charlotte and leant forward every so slightly, eager to hear her response.

After looking at the floor in thought, she finally responded. "Yeah. He deserves to know and it will probably cheer him up a LOT." Charlotte smiled gently. "Come help me tell him?"

"Sure!" The man grinned and immediately the pair made their way to their bosses room, eager to break the news.

Charlotte slowly pulled open the front to Ray's room, sending light flooding throughout the dark abyss. Each beam travelled towards the centre of the room, illuminating Ray's silhouette. He sat upright in his bed and gazed at the wall in front of him, seemingly unaware of the intruders in his room. Or perhaps he did notice, just didn't care.

"Ray? Can we talk to you?" Charlotte spoke softly, not wanting to spook the man.

There was no response, only an ever-so-slight twitch of his neck. Concerned, Charlotte sent a glance to Jasper who grimaced in return. Slowly, they edged towards Ray's bed and perched themselves on the edge.

Charlotte took a deep breath and then she spoke. "We think we've found a way to bring Henry back to life." For a moment there was no reaction. Then the words hit him. Ray lunged forwards, his eyes wide open and his mouth hanging slightly in shock.

"You can't do that that's not a thing people can do." He spoke fast, desperately attempting to disprove the others out of disbelief.

"Well we're going to do it, we've figured out how to."

"No you haven't you're a liar you're a dirty dirty dirty liar." Ray snapped at Charlotte, speaking fast and in a strange tone.

"Ray-"

"Does it make you happy telling these dirty dirty lies you liar?" The pair rolled their eyes at Ray as he continued to speak before Charlotte placed her hand on his shoulder and smiled calmly, stopping him in his rambling.

"Ray I'm serious. I'm not lying. Henry might be coming back." Slowly his expression changed, the disbelief morphing into a dazed happiness.

"Really?" He whispered as he stared wide eyed at Charlotte, who nodded slightly and widened her smile. Ray broke into a grin as tears began to roll down his face and he pulled the two into a tight hug. Charlotte, Jasper and Ray stayed like that for a while, crying softly thanks to the newfound hope.

Henry was going to live again.

I feel like I write Jasper too much like Henry tbh ahh oops. I'm just trying to make him a little more tired and mature but it's not working out tbh.