3rd Period, Mrs. Erdman's room (Advanced English), Seaford Hughes Creek High School, Chicago IL, 9/3 10:19 AM

Jack likes to think that his poker face is at least comparable to Marissa's. He's extremely good at keeping his expression completely blank, revealing nothing. He's also great at manipulating his face into whatever emotion he wants to reflect and, quickly reacting to and rolling with whatever comes his way. Surprises are a given in his field of work, and he's used to dealing with them.

That being said, when the first thing he hears upon entering his third period class is "Oh, look! Our sacrifice has arrived!" (coming from the teacher no less), he's quick to respond apologetically, "Yeah, sorry I'm late, hopefully Tlaloc doesn't mind."

Some students stare at him blankly, but without missing a beat the teacher says, "He doesn't care, all he asks is that you have plenty of tears to shed."

"Ooh, that might be a problem 'cause, see, I sacrificed my tear ducts last year, so…"

"Oh, well then you're useless then. Go offer up to Quetzalcoatl or something, I hear he's still hungry."

"Really? Isn't he fat enough?"

"You better not let him hear you say that."

"Or he'll what? Eat me?"

And then, for the first time in a long time, Jack can no longer keep a straight face. He laughs. The teacher cracks a smile as well, before turning to the class. "He's a keeper, ladies!" she proclaims in a stage whisper. "And I can see that a lot of you are looking lost, so who in here could actually keep up with that little exchange?"

A couple of people raise their hands, and Jack realizes that one of them is Milton. He quickly scans the class for any other familiar faces; Kim is the only other person he recognizes. She flashes him a smile when they make eye contact. He finds himself smiling back.

"Milton?"

"They were both Aztec gods. Tlaloc was the god of rain, and crying children were offered to him as human sacrifices. Quetzalcoatl was feathered serpent spirit god… thing, and he may or may not have been offered sacrifices as well, though no one's really sure."

"Good!" Mrs. Erdman says, clapping her hands together once. She's a portly old woman, with long silvery-blonde hair and glasses that frame amused blue eyes. She seems like the fun type, but Jack has his guard up like he would with any other person. "Brushing up on your social studies while in English, who would've thought? Now. Class, this sacrifice—" She gestures to Jack. "—happens to have a name, which is…"

"Jack."

"Jack!" she says in an 'I-totally-knew-that' tone. "Why don't you sit next to…" She scans the room. "Kim. That way she won't be lonely her whole life." She says it with a teasing smile, so Jack knows she didn't really mean it.

"Me and my lonely self—"

"Grammar!" Mrs. Erdman sings.

"My lonely self and I are actually having quite a lot of fun back here," Kim shoots back, but she moves her bag off of the seat next to her anyway. Jack walks over and sits next to her.

"Okay, guys," Mrs. Erdman says. "Warm-up's on the board. White boy! Please come see me."

Jack is confused when a black student stands up and walks over to Mrs. Erdman's desk, (he later learns that the other male's last name is White) but quickly shrugs it off and focuses on the SMART board.

In the upper corner is a Lego Hans Solo, and next to it is a timer counting down from fifteen minutes. A paragraph reads "Complete the worksheet you were given on Tuesday ALONE and INCOGNITO and HANS SOLO. No Chewbacca allowed. Offenders will be caught and 'pew pewed.'"

Even though he has that initial distrust of her that he has with everybody, Jack decides in that moment Mrs. Erdman is awesome.

3rd Period, Mr. Leech's room (History), Seaford Hughes Creek High School, Chicago IL 9/3 10:19 AM

"Hey, have you seen that guy Jack?" Eddie asks a sulking Logan. "He really looks like you."

"You're looking right at him, Eddie," CeCe drawls before Logan can answer, rolling her eyes. "Jack is just Logan messing with everyone."

"I wish," Logan scoffs. "But sadly, that's not the case. He's the reason I have detention and I haven't even met the guy yet."

"What?" Deuce asks, surprised. Even Dina looks up from her phone in curiosity at Logan's statement. "What happened? You like, never get detention."

The five of them pause in tense suspense along with the rest of the class, as the snores coming from a napping Mr. Leech momentarily cease. When they resume, the class relaxes and goes back to doing whatever it is they're not supposed to be doing.

"So… yesterday I kinda collapsed," Logan says.

"Woah, what? Are you okay?" Dina asks, concerned.

"Yeah, Ty told me Rocky was freaking out about that," Deuce says.

Logan shrugged, not so sure himself. CeCe had been goofing off and annoying the heck out of him by ordering kebabs and then deciding that she didn't like them. Then, well… he'd showed up again, for the fourth time, and that's when it hit him; this weird, sharp pain in the back of his head that set off a wave of fatigue and dizziness, like something in his brain had just snapped. He didn't even realize when he collapsed on the ground, but the last thing he remembers is Rocky showing up, and then… nothing.

The doctors had chalked it up to exhaustion after finding nothing wrong with him. He really doesn't think so, though. If it was exhaustion, wouldn't he have felt tired throughout that entire day, or been more exhausted? No, this wasn't exhaustion, of that Logan's sure.

And as if yesterday wasn't bad enough, now he's got detention because there's some guy named 'Jack' walking around and Squires thinks it's just Logan messing with him. When he walked into second period about an hour ago, he couldn't even get a word in edgewise to even attempt to explain himself. So yeah, he's feeling a bit peeved at this Jack person.

Then again… it's not Jack's fault that he and Logan look alike. But Logan needs a scapegoat and Jack fits the bill. So there.

As if sensing his thoughts, CeCe begrudgingly says, "It was kinda my fault…"

Logan sighs. "No it wasn't, CeCe, I've already told you that." Still feeling a little vindictive, he adds, "But you didn't exactly help either. Anyway, I went to the doctor's this morning so they could look at me again — I'm fine by the way — but I had to miss first period. When I showed up to second period Squires flipped out and said I was playing a joke on him or something and Mrs. Erdman is awesome." Wait, what?

"…what?" Dina says.

"I mean, not that I don't agree, but…" Eddie trails off.

"Yeah, yeah, I know." Logan doesn't even know how to explain that. Sure, he loves Mrs. Erdman, but that has nothing to do with what they're talking about right now. That… kinda felt like he tapped into someone else's head for a minute there. Weird.

7th period, Gymnasium with Coach Trent, Seaford Hughes Creek High School, Chicago IL 9/3 1:52 PM

So, apparently this Logan guy is really popular.

Or at least, many of the people that Jack has encountered today seem to know him. First there was Kim in the cafeteria, then there were two girls that called him out in the hallway after he left the beaten Black Dragons, an insane math teacher (who Jack, admittedly, had fun messing with) and a science teacher that could not get over the fact that it he was not Logan.

Marissa found out about his "little stunt" in the cafeteria (if it were anyone else Jack would be incredibly disturbed, but Marissa seems to know everything. Her knowing about the fight, despite the fact that it happened merely hours ago and the fact that she is in another country on a mission, is not very surprising). She threatened that if he didn't "play nice" and "make friends like normal people your age," then she would "get mean." This is a lot more frightening than it sounds, so Jack promised to do his best to be a social butterfly. Well, a social butterfly may not be the best term to describe him. He really cannot picture himself as a butterfly, fluttering around and being incredibly annoying. A social spider seems a bit more accurate.

It's a bit ironic, though. Marissa is the one that warns him to always be on guard on missions, to never completely trust anyone. And now she's telling him to make friends, which is pretty much trusting people is it not? Can anyone really be a friend if they're not trusted? Jack doubts it. Plus, the last friend he had is now dead.

Jack doesn't like to think about it.

Nevertheless, Jack might be well on the way to making what might be considered a "friend." Earlier, in his first class, he met a guy named Milton. He's not a giant idiot like most of the people at this school seem to be, and despite not even knowing him for a full day, Jack respects what little of the other teen that he has seen.

So his classes, in order, are Geometry, Chemistry, English, and World History. Then there's a "private tutoring session" with the assistant principal that lasts two class periods (which actually turned out to be a replacement training session since Jack can't do his daily workout anymore what with school and all), and then physical education. Jack shares two of those classes with Kim, the apple girl from the cafeteria. He found himself almost smiling when he walked into history and saw her there, which is weird because what the heck? When's the last time he genuinely smiled at a girl?... oh yeah. He'd rather not talk about Taylor. Moving on.

Last period of the day. "Physical education," or P.E. as the other students seem to call it.

Jack has to admit, he's a little concerned. He's undoubtedly more physically capable than anyone in this room because of his enhanced abilities, and he's slightly worried that something may go wrong. He doesn't have to worry about holding back with Funderburk, since the man is a CARDINAL agent, but in here? Anything could happen.

"Alright, kitties," the gym teacher, Coach Trent, booms (out of all the derogatory things he could have chosen to insult male students' masculinity, that's what he chose. That has to say something about his character. Although, isn't he the guy that called the math teacher out in the teacher's lounge for complaining about the lack of coffee in the pot? Jack has to give him props for that, because anyone within a thirty foot radius of the teacher's lounge heard Mr. Squires complaining.) "We're gonna play dodgeball today." The man grins maliciously, throwing a rubber ball back and forth between his hands.

Dodgeball. Hmm. Never heard of it.

After doing nothing but lazily dodging for a couple minutes (that is what you're supposed to do in dodgeball, right? Dodge? It's in the name) Jack gets bored and decides to throw a ball. After all, he needs to work on toning down his abilities when necessary, and this seems like a perfect way to get some practice.

As if sensing his decision, one of those loathsome rubber balls (he has an unnatural dislike of them for some reason) rolls to a stop at his feet. Jack is practically at the back of the gym or whatever this giant room is called, so the balls have normally lost most of their momentum by the time they get to the back, if they do at all. He picks up the ball. 'Here goes nothing.'

The ball slices through the air, a deadly rubber missile, and it occurs to Jack that maybe he put a teensy bit too much force behind it. He realizes a split second too late that he probably should have aimed away from someone in case that happened. It sails towards some poor sucker who's ducking down to pick up a ball and—

Bonk!

It bounces off the guy's head, ricochets off and hits another guy in the side, then rebounds off of him and hits a third in the leg. They seem fine, if not surprised, until the first guy keels over. Whoops.

The two conscious ones briefly try to revive the first, before hefting him up by his armpits and dragging him off to what is likely the coach's office. Their team seems stunned by the sudden turn of events that resulted in the loss of three of their players at once, but they quickly recover and seek revenge accordingly. Somehow, none of them look towards little ol' Jack as the culprit. The teen agent lets himself get hit in the arm and walks off to the sidelines to sit out the rest of the game.

Jack thought he was safe after that. No one seems to have noticed the killer throw, which will never cease to amaze him because really? He was the only one back there. Come on. And yet they're all none the wiser; he can tell because he can hear everyone's conversations and after singling out each of them, discovered that they're all buzzing about the ball that took out Jerry Martinez.

Oh. So that's who he hit. He never did get a good look at the other teen's face before it was full of dodgeball.

"You've got quite the arm," a voice says beside Jack as he's coming out of the locker room. Jack manages to reign in his initial reaction (flip, punch, or stab, whichever is most convenient) as he turns the source of the voice that startled him. Chase, he remembers. Milton introduced the Jack to Chase and his step brother Leo during his first class. Jack also happens to have Chemistry with him. Was the other teen waiting for him?

Jack shrugs, trying to play it off and internally cursing himself for not making sure anybody was watching. "So I've been told." Out of habit, his eyes do a quick but subtle scan of the shorter teen's figure, searching for any bumps or irregularities that would denote the presence of a hidden weapon. Then he realizes what he's doing. 'He's a normal teenager in a normal high school. Just because your favorite dagger's hidden in your shoe doesn't mean that anyone else has weapons. Why would he have any in the first place?'

Chase scoffs slightly. "So you've been told?! You pegged Jerry Martinez in the face! He's like, the Dodgeball God and you got him out. Cold, in fact. How did you do that?" He's talking at a normal level, unlike half of all the other walking sacks of testosterone in here who are practically yelling their conversations for the entire world to hear. No, random guy, Jack does not want to know about the fungus you found in your locker.

"I used to play baseball," Jack lies smoothly, heading towards the gym doors like everyone else is doing while they wait for the bell to ring. "I was my team's pitcher."

"Oh, okay. Cool." Jack studies Chase's expression out of the corner of his eye. The way the shorter teen said that kinda put him on edge. Like he knows Jack is lying. Chase is suspicious for some reason. Why's that? He's got nothing to be suspicious of… oh, who is Jack kidding? When it comes to him, there is everything to be suspicious of. Chase could just be curious about the new kid, but he seems a bit too curious. Suspicion means he's smart. Smart is dangerous. Jack needs to watch out for him.

The weird thing is, when Jack walked into Geometry that morning, he thought he recognized the other teen. After sorting through his memory back for a couple seconds, though, he deduced that he didn't know Chase from anywhere. Jack remembers everyone that he's ever met or learned about due to an enhanced mental database. That, and thinking about it temporarily worsened the mild headache he already had. He's never strained his chips just by thinking before, so he figured he should stop.

There's a beat of awkward silence between them. Then, "Have we… met, before?"

Huh. Jack isn't the only one with déjà vu, then. "You mean before this morning? I dunno. I thought I recognized you when I walked into Geometry, but I don't remember you from anywhere."

"Same here," Chase says, looking thoughtful. So maybe he's not suspicious; maybe he just wants to figure out where they've seen each other before. "I think I knew your name was Jack before Milton introduced you. Maybe passing each other on the street or something?"

"That's not possible, I just moved here," Jack reminds him. The young agent stops walking next to the bleachers a short distance away from the group of students beginning to congregate at the door, and after a second Chase does the same. Jack isn't all the way comfortable being around large groups of people, especially one this loud, so he'll keep his distance if he can help it.

"Right, right." Chase's lips are pursed slightly, eyebrows drawn in concentration. Jack is thinking, too, of all the different countries he's been in, or the different states and cities in the U.S. Again, he feels the headache worsening. Headaches normally signify something going on with his chips, so he stops before he overloads his system. The last time that happened, he was running on adrenaline and whatever strange power the chips give him, and when that adrenaline wore off he crashed. Literally. He was driving a speedboat.

(Luckily, he was only putting some distance between himself and an illegal weapons factory that he'd just blown up. No one came after him, thank god. He passed out and the boat probably kept going until it hit some shoreline. He assumes that its engine kept running until it used up all the gas. He couldn't tell because he was, you know, unconscious. According to JD, he was out for almost a full day. )

Jack debates asking Chase if he's ever lived anywhere else, ready with the excuse that he himself used to move around a lot. But he really shouldn't give out unnecessary information. Then again, he supposes if he's gaining a potential ally—er, friend— then Chase should know a little about him. Although, he's tried that before and—

"Hey, Logan! Nice— whoa, oof."

Jack blinks, staring at the person he'd just flipped. He'd only just managed to restrain the urge to whip his dagger out of his shoes and interrogate the other teen at knifepoint. It's not Jack's fault. As he's already said, his first instinct is to attack or stab at sudden assailants. The other male just came out of nowhere, accompanied by a sudden onslaught of noise and a slap on Jack's shoulder that set the teen agent off and made him go on the defensive. He shouldn't have surprised Jack like that. Then again, Jack supposes high school is full of little surprises like that. He's gotta be careful or he might accidentally stab someone. So much for "relaxing and acting like a normal teenager."

High school is so complicated.

"Wow. Okay, that hurt," the teen (now on the ground) groans.

"Sorry," Jack says, offering a hand and hoping those headphones around the other male's neck aren't broken. Jack shoots a cold glare at any bystanders, and they start to walk away. Nothing to see here. "You surprised me. And it's Jack, not Logan. Apparently I really look like him, but I just moved here yesterday."

The other teen blinks, looking surprised. "Really?" He leans closer, a little too close for comfort. "Wow. You really look like him." He leans back. "Note to self: don't surprise new kid," he says, but he offers an easy-going smile to show that Jack is forgiven. Like Jack cares if he's forgiven or not. No, wait, he's supposed to be making friends. Ugh. "I'm Deuce," the other male says, and Jack nods in acknowledgement.

"You take martial arts?" Chase asks, after witnessing the exchange.

"I dapple," Jack says. (Understatement of the century, ha.)

"What belt are you?" Chase asks.

"Third-degree black," Jack responds. Okay, maybe Jack should have lied that time.

"You call that dappling? You seem to enjoy downplaying your abilities. That's still cool, though." Chase has the physique of a martial artist, now that Jack think about it, but he notices that the spiky-haired teen doesn't share his belt ranking. Should Jack ask?

"Awesome job taking out my cousin," Deuce says, grinning. "That was great! How do you throw like that?"

"I used to be a pitcher for a baseball team," Jack responds, repeating the same lie he told Chase (and silently rethinking how many people could have seen him throw that ball). Deuce nods like that's an acceptable answer.

"I'm guessing you're the Jack that took out those Black Dragons in the cafeteria this morning?" he asks.

Jack nods, allowing a cocky smirk. "The one and only."

Deuce grins again. He seems to do that a lot. "It's great that someone finally knocked them down a notch. I think we're all tired of them at this point.

He stops and scrutinizes Jack again. "Are you sure that you're not just Logan screwing with me?"

"No, I've just been lying to you this entire time."

Deuce stares.

Note to self: tone down on sarcasm. "I'm kidding."

"Chase!" What is it with the people here loudly inserting themselves into other people's conversations?! The newcomer is tall, taller than Jack is by a few inches (which is saying something, because Jack himself is 5'9"). Jack thinks he's the guy from earlier, the one with the fungus in his locker. "Hey, little bro, did you see the guy that took out Jerry? That ball went came out of nowhere! It's almost like that time I threw that—"

"He's right here, Adam," Chase interrupts, motioning to Jack with a brief 'are-you-stupid?-shut-up' look on his face aimed in Adam's direction. Jack doesn't miss it, and wonders what Adam was about to say. Jack also files the fact that they're brothers away in one of his many brain drawers.

Adam turns to Jack, head cocking to the side in curiosity. "Logan? I didn't know you were in this class. I thought you had Business Management this period." He leans toward Jack, glancing around as if checking for eavesdroppers. Jack tenses and leans back. Does the term 'personal space' mean anything around here? "Unless you're Logan's secret twin?" Adam whispers conspiratorially.

"Wha- No, I'm not Logan's secret twin. My name's Jack," Jack says, with a small frown. Secret twin? How would that even work?

"Oh." Adam leans back, looking slightly disappointed, but then he brightens again. "If you are, your secret's safe with me," he whispers too loudly, and then winks in an exaggerated manner. Behind him, Chase rolls his eyes. Jack gets the feeling that something like this isn't abnormal for Adam.

"So, little bro," Adam says, throwing an arm around an unamused Chase's shoulder. "We have a job to do." Chase raises an eyebrow at his brother, silently asking… something. Adam nods almost imperceptibly.

The final bell rings, and both Jack and Chase wince. Jack knows he himself isn't quite used to the bell yet, but why did Chase flinch? Maybe the sound startled the other teen. Loud noises like that can surprise someone who isn't paying attention.

"Well, we'll be seeing you later, then," Chase says. For a brief second, there's a peculiar expression on the other teen's face that Jack can't identify. But just as soon as it was there, it's gone, leaving Jack to wonder if there was even anything worth noticing in the first place. Chase straightens and shrugs Adam's arm off of his shoulder, seemingly annoyed. With that, the two brothers walk away.

Underground lab, Davenport residence, Chicago IL 9/3 4:20 PM

"Hey, Mr. Davenport?"

"Hmm?"

"Is it possible for me to… forget someone?"

The question had been on Chase's mind ever since he left the school and throughout the (extremely brief, it barely took ten minutes) mission they'd gone on after P.E.. He feels like he knows Jack, or at least knew him at some point, and it's really bugging him. Where has he seen the other teen before?

And why doesn't he remember it?

Prior to that day, Chase had never met the "Logan" that both Deuce and Adam (and Mr. Squires) mistook Jack for. However, right after leaving the gym, Chase happened to glance through the window of a nearby classroom, one that was usually reserved for detention. Sitting there, right next to the windows with his head resting on one hand and a dejected look on his face…

…was a guy that looked exactly like Jack.

He'd stood there gaping for a few moments before Adam had helpfully informed Chase that his mouth would make the perfect fly-catcher.

When Chase meets a new person, someone that isn't already in his database, his facial recognition app brings up pre-existing faces of similar looking people and calculates the resemblances into percentages. As expected, seeing Logan brought Jack up in his database… but the facial match was ninety-four percent. The most that Chase had ever seen was just over sixty!

The resemblance between the two is almost scary. It's not possible for two people to look that similar, unless they were twins or clones or something like that. Well, them being twins is more likely, because a match with a clone probably would be a hundred percent. Then again, their hairstyles were a little different…

But twins? How would that be possible? According to Jack, he'd never met Logan before, and had just moved to Seaford Hughes Creek the day before. Chase has heard of twins separating at birth and going years without knowing about the other's existence before finally meeting, but only in movies and stories. What are the odds of it actually happening?

So then there's the clone theory. Why would someone clone Logan, though? As far as Chase knows, Logan has lived a fairly mundane life (he knows since he kinda… hackedtheschool'sdatabase, but that's besides the point). He was adopted at a young age, and currently lives in an apartment with his adoptive father. He manages a teen-operated kebab joint down at the mall and has all A's… nothing that raises a red flag. Plus, Logan would have had to have been cloned at birth in order for his duplicate to appear his same age.

Then again, it's entirely possible to look normal and inconspicuous and be anything but. Chase and his siblings know all about that. Maybe he should keep an eye on "Logan."

Jack, on the other hand… he actually seems pretty suspicious. First there was the dodgeball that he threw in gym. No ball thrown by any normal human should go that fast, even for a baseball player. And even if he had played baseball as a kid, baseballs and dodgeballs are two different objects; a baseball player wouldn't be used to the size or texture of a dodgeball, and would have to overcompensate to make up for the increased weight and increased air resistance that a dodgeball would entail.

Plus, the other teen had hesitated for a split second when asked about the ball that took out Jerry freaking Martinez. (Which is an amazing feat, since Chase had never witnessed the Latino get out before.) If it were anyone else, they probably wouldn't have noticed the hesitation, but to Chase it was just long enough to think up a lie.

Then there was the move the other teen had pulled with Deuce. Sure, a third degree black belt may have reflexes tuned to react like that in that situation, but really, only someone that's regularly in a situation where their senses should be in high alert would react like that to a simple clap on the shoulder. Jack had also downplayed his abilities, which is what someone who's used to not drawing attention to themself would do (or a really humble person, but considering the cocky tone of voice the teen in question had taken on when Deuce queried about what happened in the cafeteria, Chase doubts this is the case.)

Jack had also winced when the dismissal bell rang. From Chase the flinch makes sense; despite having conditioned himself to withstand the sound, it still catches him by surprise now and then. It might have been that the bell had startled the other teen, but Chase isn't so sure. There was a flash of pain on the other male's face, not surprise.

Finally, there's the whole "déjà vu" vibe that Chase had gotten from the teen when seeing him for the first time in geometry. It could be that Chase had simply seen Logan in passing in the hallway and thought he recognized Jack, but he doesn't think so. The feeling was much stronger than that of just briefly seeing someone's face a couple times.

It occurs to Chase that he may be reading into the situation too much. Maybe Jack is just a normal guy who happens to look eerily similar to another student. Chase just isn't too keen on trusting new people after the Marcus fiasco.

Chase is snapped out of his little reverie when Donald laughs. "Forget? Chase, you have the best memory in the entire world. Even if your conscious mind forgets someone, your subconscious stores everyone that you meet in your database. All you have to do is use your facial recognition app." The billionaire looks up from the random device he's tinkering with. "What brought this on?"

"Nothing," Chase replies, maybe a bit too quickly. "Just wondering."

Donald stares at the teen suspiciously. Chase smiles in a way that he hopes says 'I'm-innocent-that's-me-innocent-Chase-completely-innocent.' After a few moments, the inventor shrugs and goes back to whatever he was working on, which is… a a robotic forearm?

The elevator opens, and Adam, Bree, and Leo walk into the lab before Chase can ask his surrogate father about his latest invention. From what Chase can tell, his brother and stepbrother are bickering about the better of two fictional universes and Bree is rolling her eyes at both of them.

"DC is totally better," Chase and Mr. Davenport say simultaneously, causing Leo to squawk indignantly.

"Wow, you guys, thanks for taking my side," the dark-skinned teen says sarcastically.

"But they didn't," Adam says, confused. "They took my side."

Bree rolls her eyes. "You said you had a mission for us, Mr. Davenport?"

"Ah, yes," the man says, abandoning his project and walking over to the holo-desk. "It looks like there's a shipment of some sort coming in today, or at least a meeting to talk about it. You guys are going to do some recon and find out what's going on. Leo will be helping you."

"What?" Chase says, surprised, quickly forgetting to ask Davenport about the arm thing he's working on. "I mean, Leo's cool and all, but are you not going to be here?"

"No. I have a… meeting, that I gotta get to in a few minutes."

Chase raises an eyebrow at the hesitation, but doesn't comment. "Alright. What do we have to do?"

Seemingly abandoned warehouse in the woods, Chicago IL 9/3 4:33 PM

Okay, not one of his best mob hits.

Jack looks around at the mess he made, mentally scolding himself. Taking a full six minutes to take out only four lugs with guns? Unacceptable.

He finds himself swaying slightly and braces himself against a nearby pile of crates (knowing full well that one of the targets he just eliminated is buried somewhere under that pile) and huffs, annoyed at his own weakness.

His vision flashes. Suddenly, he's in an unfamiliar living room, his head in someone's lap as fingers gently card through his hair. But then, just as soon as the flash occurred, he's back in the transport warehouse. The headache is almost unbearable, and he keeps getting lightheaded and almost losing his balance. What in the actual heck was that?! So he's hallucinating now, too?! He really has to have chat with JD.

'Speaking of JD…' Jack blinks as orange text scrolls across his vision, a message from JD via his chip. 'PREPPED FOR CHIP REBOOT AND LIMB REPLACEMENT. WE'RE READY WHEN YOU GET BACK.'

We? Is JD not doing this by himself? Now that Jack thinks about it, he supposes the 'billionaire benefactor' is there with him. Probably best to head out now and—

Crack!

Jack's head snaps up towards the source of the sound, a window a distance away. 'What was that? Came from window, something is outside. Trees are relatively healthy, unlikely to be branch falling. Processing list of Seaford wildlife… Unlikely a bear, but has to be heavy judging by decibel of noise. Two distinctly erratic breathing patterns detected. Conclusion? Unexpected human presence(s).'

His conclusion is only confirmed when he hears the sound of two pairs of running footsteps, along with panicked whisper-shouts. He groans in annoyance. As much as he wants to have JD check him out right now, he can't just ignore this new development. Irritation fuels his actions as he cracks his neck before stalking off in the direction of the door.

Hey, you guys! So these first few chapters are going to be a little expository-ish, and then chapters afterwards will (in theory) be structured more like individual episodes.

Until next time,

~BH