"God no" is the only thing his brain manages to produce and push past his lips before he dives forward, nearly breaking his outstretched arm as his elbow smashes into the bedframe. He thinks he shouts some word that no child ought to hear, and just uses the hand at the end of that arm to snatch up the papers, as the good one is busy gripping his elbow tightly.

There's no picture; just a short series of paragraphs in infuriatingly large font considering the diminished amount of information that can fit in the given space as a result. He starts reading, but quickly realizes he's two sentences in and has processed exactly nothing except for Juliet's name.

He starts over, tears stinging his eyes, but none falling.

"At approximately 11:30 in the morning on Thursday, September 5th, a team of detectives from the Santa Barbara Police Department were investigating a hit-and-run accident when the engine of the victim's overturned vehicle spontaneously exploded. Detective Juliet O'Hara and police consultant Bruton Gaster (known for working with psychic detective Arashk Ronaldo, who recently disappeared) were wounded but are expected to make full recoveries.

"Though it is widely theorized that this was no accident, no conclusions have been drawn and examination of the wreckage continues. 'The cause of the explosion is yet to be discovered,' says Head Detective Carlton Lassiter. 'Investigation is currently underway. We have no further information to divulge at this time.'"

That's it. That's freaking it. The article itself doesn't even extend to the second page; the rest is just logos and crap from the website. He reads through it a second time, and once he gets to the end, he automatically looks up, scanning the rest of the room.

There. On his nightstand, next to the lamp. The two papers flutter to the floor as he leaps onto the bed and grabs the photos he sees there, and he sits on his feet at the head of the bed, staring at them, the sharp pain in his arm forgotten.

An image of Gus is on top. He's frozen in midstride as he walks across the Psych office, face contorted in pain as he presses one hand against his back. The picture offers a pretty complete view of the little office, apparently from somewhere near the ceiling, and appears to be a screenshot.

He's got a camera in our office.

Which is not nearly the worst of it, as he moves immediately to the second picture, and his bones freeze in place.

It's Juliet, curled up on her couch at home, fully dressed but fast asleep. A small white bandage doesn't quite cover a long cut near her temple, and her right arm—her shooting arm, he immediately thinks—is in a sling.

The image is very clear, and very close.

Somebody was inside Juliet's house while she was asleep.

He just barely makes it to the toilet to empty his stomach. He sits on the floor, head resting against the clean porcelain, smudging it with the sweat that's rolling off his body in buckets, despite the temperature of his clammy skin. His breathing is ragged, and the only way to get his hands to stop shaking is to press them flat against the wall.

He's not thinking in words anymore; he doesn't have the strength for that right now. He's thinking in fears. In guilt.

Strategically, this tips the scale definitely in the Master's favor. What this has done above all else is effectively demonstrate that his threats are legitimate, that he does have every capability of following up on them, that he will not hesitate to do so, and that he's nowhere close to being caught.

He releases a shuddering breath. If this is what happened as a result of a few suspicious words exchanged with the resident acrobat… well, now's not the time to be thinking about what he'd find back home were he ever to actually disappear from this place entirely.

He did this. The Master told him "Don't say anything I wouldn't like," and what does he do? He starts hinting at anyone who asks just what's going on. Didn't have the balls to say enough to make any difference, didn't have the balls to keep his trap shut.

And now Jules and Bruton have paid the price.

His head snaps up. Bruton? Stupid article. Stupid journalists. It's Gus. Juliet and Gus.

Slowly he begins to stand. His elbow bumps against the toilet lid on the way up, and he inhales sharply as pain shoots down his arm. He twists it around to examine it, and finds an impressive array of colors mottling at least three square inches of his forearm just above his elbow.

At least he didn't get hit by an explosion.

He returns to his bed, feet dragging, and picks up the papers again. He reads the article—this damn thing's got some nerve calling itself an article at this length—a third time, a fourth, a fifth. By the sixth time he's seeing the explosion vividly in his mind—Juliet being thrown onto the hard concrete and landing right on top of her arm, Lassiter reaching out from several feet away but able to do nothing, Gus taking a back full of shrapnel and breaking his wrist as he's flung forward…

He pauses, and looks back at that mention of Gus.

"Known for working with psychic detective Arashk Ronaldo."

"That's not my name," he whispers.

Of course, this article could easily have been edited before being printed off. In fact that's certainly what happened. So why, after he noticed that something was off about the name, did he feel even the slightest hint of doubt?

No, of course his name is…

It's…

He holds still for ten seconds, twenty, thirty, groping desperately around his mind and coming up empty-handed.

Finally he allows himself to do what every part of him has been screaming for him to do for the last half-minute that felt like an eternity: he dashes across the room to his dresser, hears a mighty crack as he yanks open the top drawer, and reaches for the back, rifling around the small amount of clothes he's chosen to store in there, searching for his identity.

…Normally he'd have found it by now.

He peers into the drawer, and seeing nothing, he starts to remove the clothes from inside in what he's trying to make a calm manner.

The drawer is empty very quickly.

His name isn't in there.


He wakes up lying on top of his gimp arm, sore and aching in numerous places besides. It takes him about three seconds to remember why.

His face is pressed into the carpet, and after a moment he identifies the various lumps between him and the floor as pieces of clothing discarded after being removed from his dresser. He slowly draws his good arm up from his side and braces his hand against the carpet, pushing his upper body up an inch or so so that he can pull his right arm free. Wincing in pain, wishing he had control over his position while he sleeps, he slowly and steadily moves his arm free from its trap. The process takes over a minute of agonizingly painful concentration, and once he manages it, he flips over on his back and stares at the ceiling.

He thinks he dreamed something last night. Vague feelings of alarm, fuzzy pain, a muffled boom that just plays in his head over and over.

His right wrist still hurts. He rubs it absently, and glances down at his arm. Yep, the skin just below his elbow is sporting outstanding hues of blue and purple, tinged with yellow on the edges. How beautiful.

Sitting up is fortunately fairly easy. He glances at his bed, wondering if it might be a good idea to pull himself on top of it and go back to sleep. But as his internal clock indicates, and to which the sunlight currently threading through his blinds attests, it's not that early.

Suddenly remembering, he gets up on his knees, and surveys the top of his still-made bed. It's notably empty of any paper or photos.

He drops back to a sitting position on the floor. He's not going to go through another minute of fruitless searching and suppressed screams. It's exhausting, and it hurts too much, and he's not going to find anything; he knows that now.

He pictures the Master entering his room, taking in the scene before him—his basically enslaved psychic dead asleep on the floor, dresser drawers open, clothes everywhere—and simultaneously scowls and cringes at the satisfaction that must have given him. Not to mention how totally creepy and unnerving it is to think that the guy was in here while he was asleep. He pictures the man stepping carefully over his unconscious form to get to the bed and remove the papers and photos. They've probably been destroyed by now, or discarded in some local trash bin that he can have no hope of finding. Along with the slip of paper that carried his identity. Or at least the words that were assigned to him at his birth. Just words. They're not all that matters.

So Jules and Gus were hurt by an explosion rigged by instruction of his captor. But not too badly, and it was just them. They're not "safe," but they're okay. Jules, Gus, Lassiter, Dad—they're all in one piece.

He's a piece of crap for endangering them like this. But the Master… there aren't words for what he is. And while this is certainly a setback, it's not a defeat.

He climbs to his feet, and slowly begins gathering the clothing up off the floor, a sort of guilty triumph finding its place in his mind. The Master must think he's won. Fine, he won't be uncooperative anymore. He'll do as he's told.

Next time he makes an attempt to get out of this, he won't half-ass it.

And as for his name…

All right, he's Arashk Ronaldo.

But Arashk Ronaldo's not giving up yet.