I should probably feel something. Some kind of reaction to what Jake has told me. And yet... Everything is calm. Perhaps the storm is near. But for now, calm. I shift my grip on the Warden, who has fallen completely asleep, exhausted by pain.

"Gave us our powers?" My voice doesn't sound quite right, but I use it anyway.

Jake talks while he plays with Misha's hands, keeping the boy entertained. "Yes ma'am! Did you think you were born with them?" He looks at my face and apparently that was answer enough. "Ah... Well, no. You weren't. If you like I could tell you what I know...?"

I was nodding before he'd finished speaking, crushing the Warden close to me in an effort to have something to hold on to. "Yes... Please." I need to know what I am.

"Well... Alright." Jake gently removes Misha from his lap. "Go on now, skipper! This is gunna get all long and boring, so go do something fun, okay?"

"Okay!" Misha starts to walk away on his short little legs, pausing at the door to say, "Bye Mommy. G'night Daddy."

"Bye, sweetie." I watch him go. I'm not worried about him being safe, my little baby is stronger than anyone in this place. I look back to Jake, dreading what he has to reveal that was so grand that the very River of Time would not permit me to see it.

Jake begins his explanation.

~~~
I don't know all the details of how They went about all this, creating you and him, but I know how They got the formula into you. They- What? Who's They? Oh, They're a large organization with no official name spread across all the biggest powers, America, France, Great Britain, all those. The place that sent me has no name either, but We're essentially the opposite of Them. They want to enslave the world, We want to keep it free. Anyway, where was I? Ah, yes. The formulas.

The first, the male, was easiest to find. His father didn't want him, figured it would be better if he was made into something useful. So he volunteered his boy as a sacrifice and started to feed him that... Stuff.

A man called only Warden, though he is not our precious Warden, stands in front of his superiors and offers his son as a sacrificial lamb. "He's worthless as he is. If the formula kills him, well, at least I won't have to deal with him anymore."

A package is given, a man goes home, white powder is mixed heavily with the normal slop that a boy is fed. The bowl is delivered. The child eats.

The package was meant to last three months. It barely lasted one.

The child lives, but the only effect the formula seems to have is that he is less responsive to pain, his mind is slower, and when asked a question he used to know, his answers are twisted and odd. Something has happened to the boy's brain and They do not know what to make of it. They do not terminate the boy and he grows a little older. Then, one day, quite on accident, he makes a little lego toy appear in a place it shouldn't have been, and just like that he becomes an orphan.

They realized then that it had worked. They tried to get you, but somehow They weren't fast enough. Once you were in the adoption center my people were able to change your name, scramble your records, keep you away from Them. I was ordered to kill you, but like I said, I don't kill children. So they said, okay. We'll wait. So wait we did, and while we were waiting They altered the formula for Their second lamb. The female.

It took longer to find someone with a little girl younger than ten that was willing to use the formula. They'd seen what it had done to the boy's mind, how it had wore it away. Then a man brought up his niece.

"My brother has a little girl." A man named Robert (L/N) stands in front of his superiors and gives up his own flesh and blood. There is little debate before the man's offer is accepted and he too is given a package. He is a smart man and he understands where the first went wrong, what broke the male. It was too much, three months worth of conversion over a single month was too much for his brain to handle and it became cracked. Unhinged. Robert will do better. His girl will be perfect.

When he arrives, his brother welcomes him with open arms. A week after moving in, he begins. The little girl loves her 'Uncle Billy'. She will not hesitate to eat whatever candy he gives her. She does not know what the treats are laced with.

A month and a half later, she is beginning to show signs of change. She is not the gentle girl she used to be. Instead of taking bugs outside to live, she pulls off their legs and leaves them on her windowsill to die. Her dolls are methodically torn limb from limb, the most in-tact ones incarcerated in a lego jail. Her friends abandon her because she has become scary, but she does not feel enough to care. However, she can still think and learn and use logic and she still feels deep love and loyalty for her family. The man and his superiors consider this a great success.

The three months are complete. All that is left now is for the girl to have a month of settling time so that her body can acclimate to her new mind and then she will be spirited away, never to be seen again unless They wish her to be.

But the Other Side got to her first. In the dead of night, a small boy, no older than twelve, sneaks into the house where the girl lives and lies in wait. He knows his quarry's patterns. He knows the man will come.

When the man enters the kitchen, the boy strikes just as the light is flicked. The blinding change in illumination does not bother him. He has been trained to not need his eyes. He uses a knife, though guns are his preferred weapon, and the man's stomach cuts open easily, like a hot knife through butter. The man is dying, though he does not seem to know it. He looks confused as he sits on the floor trying to hold himself together.

And then the girl walks in. She is small, so very small, and the boy cannot bring himself to harm her even though he knows what she is. Instead he drops the knife and flees, turning back once to see her standing in a pool of red, the weapon held in her shaking fingers.

The man weakly says her name and she runs away, dropping the cold blade to the floor. The boy is not punished for his inability to complete his mission. His side is kind. They understand. Another is sent to take the girl before They can, but she is already gone, having run away. She thinks she is the one that killed her 'sweet' uncle. She is scared that she will hurt her Ma or Pa. The boy's side helps the girl disappear and she roams alone until, one day, she decides to hijack a plane. And so, she came to Superjail.

~~~
Jake laughed softly, shaking his head. "They always wanted you to be together, you know. Wanted to... Breed you. Make weapons. All that." His green eyes are deep, like the blackness between the stars, and in their depth I can see the guilt of every life he has ever taken. His smile is sad. "One, with power of physical, one with power of spiritual. They hoped your child would be both."

"He isn't," I mumble automatically, my mind frantically trying to grasp what Jake has told me. I did not kill my uncle. My uncle was evil. My uncle wanted to make me into a weapon. Jake killed him. I did not. I didn't. I did nothing. I am a weapon. I feel something crack in my head and suddenly I remember him, standing with a knife in his hand, black hair wild, his green eyes not quite so pained.

"Oh my God..." I can feel the tears coming. I don't want to cry, I've only ever cried three times in my whole life, I don't want that number to raise. But it's too late and there's nothing I can do to stop them now. The drops roll down my cheeks and fall onto the Warden's face. His eyes flicker open, blue veined with violet, and he smiles shakily.

"Hey, sweetheart." It's too bright in here, the lights hurt my eyes, and so I curve my spine to duck down enough to hide my face in the Warden's neck, shaking all over no matter how much I tense my muscles to stop it. "Hey, hey, what's up?" The Warden sits up and holds me, trying to help, but he doesn't know how to make it better, he can't know how to make it better, because They broke him when he was just a little boy.

He deserves to know what we are, why we are, but I know if I talk I'll cry harder. So I close my eyes and, carefully, link my soul with his and give him all the memories of when he slept in my arms. It takes only a few seconds and when I pull back he gasps. He is silent for a moment, then, softly and brokenly, he whispers, "Papa didn't love me?"

It's his turn to break down then, sobbing and wailing in my arms and I do my best to help him but I also know that it's impossible for me to really help. All I could do is destroy every memory he has of his father and I couldn't do that, not unless he asked. When he finally cries himself out I nudge him off of me. He sits next to me, his eyes locked on the floor. I look around and see his glasses- they must have gotten knocked off by Jake- and I pick them up, gently putting them in his hands. He sniffs and puts them on, muttering a thank you. I kiss him gently, but he barely responds. I want to touch him, to see what the fragments of his soul look like now, but I am also afraid of what I'll find.

I turn back to Jake.

"Jake. Can I ask you something?"

He jumps a bit then nods. "Wh-What is it?"

"What's his name? Your swordsman?"

Jake seems confused, his hand going to his gun, not threateningly, just to run his thumb along the smooth white handles. "Don't you already know...?"

I shrugged. "I try not to learn everything about everyone that I find remotely interesting. If I did, I might never leave the River."

"The river...?"

I nod, thankful for the opportunity to focus on something other than my origin story. "Yes. What I can do, seeing and altering time, it comes to me like a great River." I decide not to tell him about the River Styx. Those dark waters are a secret not even the Warden knows.

Jake gives a hum to show he heard, but his eyes are distant. He's quiet for a long time. Then the ghost of something that might once have been a smile crossed his face. "His name is Dirk." Dirk. That's a nice name. Jake glances at me, his eyes focusing. "Hey... C-Can you check you river and see if... If I get to be with him again?"

I already know the answer, but I close my eyes and look anyway, tracing Jake's line to where it gets all tangled up in Dirk's orange again. Hehehe. Dirk's going to drop kick Jake when he sees him again. Then he's going to kiss him. The drop kick comes first though. I come back and smile. "Yes, Jake, you most certainly will."

A shiver of relief goes through Jake and he shuts his eyes, tipping his head back and whispering a prayer. When he speaks to me again, his voice is half-choked with tears. "Thank you."

"Mmhmm." I take the Warden's hand and he barely grips me back. His eyes are dead. I'm just about to say something when Misha marches in, a little green unicorn crayon and a piece of paper gripped in his tiny fists.

He ignores both me and Jake, going straight to his Daddy and sitting down, doodling a picture with the unicorn's horn. "See Daddy, it's easy to use 'em."

The Warden blinks and watches Misha doodle. He smiles, just barely, and says, "I thought green wasn't a creative color?"

"It's not." Misha scribbles some more and offeres the Warden his crayon. "But sometimes you need it anyway."

The Warden takes the wax unicorn and slowly lays down on his stomach, adding a terrible picture next to Misha's equally-terrible picture. "Sometimes you need it anyway..."

"Mmhmm." Misha pats his father on the head and I can't help but marvel at my son. How did he know? Did he even? Or was it just coincidence that he comes in here so determinedly with exactly what the Warden needs? Jake is looking at him with the same affectionate amazement that I feel and I suddenly remember Misha's greeting to Jake.

"Hey, Misha?" My boy barely glances at me.

"Yeah?"

"Why did you call Jake 'big brother'?"

"Cuz that's who he is." Misha says it so confidently, like it's as obvious as how to use unicorn crayons. I don't understand my son at all.

I start to ask him to be more specific, but I'm so tired... I decide that maybe I've had enough of answers today. "Jake, we have a room for you. Just... Just go find Alice, okay? She'll take you there. I'd do it myself, but I just..." Not really thinking, I start running my hand through the Warden's short hair. I wonder where his hat is.

Jake nods and stands up, looking suddenly self conscious. "Yes. Yep. Righto. Uh... Who's Alice?"

"Huge girl, red hair, can't miss her." I lay down on the hard floor and lay my head on the Warden's back for a pillow. I don't hear Jake leave, but the River tells me that he does. I do not want to sleep. I'm scared of what my subconscious will make me dream. But, eventually, we all have to dream.

My dream is blessedly quiet.