The needle's tip pierced his skin with a sharp, intimate sting. It was a small thing—barely more than a pinprick—but it carried the finality of a guillotine blade. As the plunger depressed, the liquid slid into his veins, cold and invasive, spreading through his bloodstream like an unwelcome truth.
His breath hitched.
At first, nothing happened. Then everything did.
The room bent inward, the walls folding like wet parchment. Colors bled into one another, light smearing and stretching until it lost all meaning. The hum in his ears swelled into a roaring silence, and the weight of his body vanished. He tried to blink, but the darkness swallowed his sight whole.
He was falling.
No—floating.
When sensation returned, he found himself suspended in a vast, lightless expanse. There was no ground beneath his feet, no sky above his head. Just an endless dark, thick and suffocating, yet strangely calm—like the inside of a sealed tomb.
He wasn't alone.
Two figures stood before him.
The first made his breath catch in his throat. The man looked exactly like him—same face, same build, same faint scar along the jawline. But there was something wrong with the familiarity. This version of him stood straighter, eyes hollow yet burning with purpose, as though death itself had carved resolve into his bones.
The second figure was different.
He wore his resemblance loosely, as though it were an echo rather than a mirror. His presence felt heavier, older. His posture was crooked, burdened by invisible chains, and his eyes—sharp, knowing—seemed to look through him rather than at him.
The unfamiliar man spoke first.
"You are me," he said, his voice calm but steeped in bitterness, "and I am you."
The words reverberated through the void, not carried by sound but by understanding. They pressed against his thoughts, demanding to be heard.
"The place you are going to," the man continued, "is the place where I once was. I have suffered greatly there. A kingdom—one that should have been bestowed upon me—was given to others. Not because I was unworthy. Not because I lacked strength or blood or will."
His eyes darkened.
"But because someone crippled me before I could inherit it."
The meaning slid past him like smoke through grasping fingers. A kingdom? A betrayal? None of it made sense. His thoughts felt slow, waterlogged, as if his mind were drowning.
Before he could speak—before he could even form a question—the version of himself stepped forward.
"You are me," the familiar voice said, "and I am you."
He paused, turning his head toward the other man, and for a moment something like shared grief passed between them.
"By now," he continued, "the shot that me—and you—have injected ourselves with has killed us."
The words struck with brutal clarity.
Killed.
His chest tightened, panic blooming too late to matter.
"But we," the man said, emphasizing the word as though it were sacred, "have decided to give you another chance."
The darkness seemed to lean closer.
"I will ask you to enact revenge on the ones that hurt us," he went on. "Make the world tremble when the order to hunt is given. Let nations shake when your name is whispered. Take our will. Take our hatred. Conquer the world, and show us that the sacrifice we have made was worth it."
Sacrifice.
The word echoed, heavy with blood and intent.
The unfamiliar man raised his hands.
They shimmered.
Golden light burst forth from his palms, radiant and defiant against the void. It coalesced slowly, shaping itself into something solid, something symbolic. Above his hand hovered a single card.
A poker card.
Its edges gleamed as if forged from sunlight, gilded with intricate golden filigree that crawled across its surface like living veins. At its center was a helmet—a knight's helm, scarred and noble—but where a plume or mantling should have been, there was only a single fragment of a jester's hat, tipped with a small bell that glinted faintly.
The card glitched.
For a fraction of a second, its image fractured and reassembled, as though reality itself struggled to decide what it was meant to be.
Knight.
Jester.
King.
Fool.
The card was magnificent—beautiful in a way that inspired both awe and unease. Power radiated from it, ancient and volatile, humming with restrained chaos.
The two figures turned toward him together.
In perfect unison, they spoke:
"We are you, and you are us. We all are together—one and the same person."
Their voices layered over one another, past and future collapsing into a single moment.
"Your name," they declared, "is JESTER."
The card shot forward.
He had no time to scream.
No time to run.
It struck his chest and passed through flesh as though it were smoke, sinking into him—into his very being. Fire erupted beneath his skin, racing through his veins, carving symbols into his soul. He felt himself unravel and reform, memories twisting, instincts sharpening into something feral and precise.
He was more.
And less.
And something entirely new.
His consciousness wavered, fragments of laughter and screams echoing in the distance. The darkness closed in once more, heavy and final.
As his eyes closed, one thought burned brighter than the rest:
The world would remember the day the Jester was born.