[Las Vegas, Nevada, USA - 07:41 PST]
Magnifico Marco woke up sober. That was the first problem.
He sat upright on the narrow hotel bed, sequins stuck to the sheets, and listened. Vegas should have been loud. It wasn't.
Vibrations built inside him—visions of lives that weren't his, unfolding in gymnasiums, research centers, and schools.
"Could I be going insane?"
They echoed through his bones and made his molars ache. Later he found himself on the carpet holding a single playing card.
Marco stared. He hadn't been playing cards in his sleep. He no longer even owned a full deck; the last one was buried under duplicates and torn halves in his dressing room. Yet here it was, face-up, crisp, deliberately placed.
A Joker.
Its freakish smile stared, tilting like it knew something. He held the card up with two fingers and tried to burn it. Blue flames licked the edges, but the card didn't even char. No multiplication either. The power was choosing.
That was worse. It meant whatever lived inside him now could choose.
His phone rang from the nightstand. A call, then a voicemail notification from management—again. His thumb hadn't touched accept, but the phone answered itself. His voice slid into performance mode automatically. "Marco Bellini speaking. Magnifico Marco."
"Save it," Gina snapped. Club manager. The one who'd watched the doves burst from his pan with her mouth open. "Where are you?"
"In bed," Marco said, then winced. "I mean—rehearsing. Mentally."
"You have a meeting at noon," Gina said. Papers rustled; she sounded furious, which was new. "Don't you dare be late. And don't pull whatever that was last night again."
"Gina, I didn't mean—"
"I know," she cut in. "That's why I'm calling before the owners do. Listen. Private gig tonight. Uptown. Real money. Real people."
Marco's heart skipped. "Why?"
"Someone sent a video," Gina said. "Your… incident. It's circulating in the right circles. The kind who think strange is exclusive."
Marco glanced at the Joker in his hand. The hum, echoed again, as if in agreement.
"Gina I'm not a Jester nor a Joker"
"No," Gina said, softer now. "You're an opportunity. For them. For us. For you—if you stop falling apart."
He threw the card. "What's the deal?"
"The catch," Gina said, "is you show up sober, sharp, and together. Normal act. Then, at the end, you give them just a taste of… that. Controlled. One minute. Not a hurricane."
Marco laughed almost maniacally. He'd mastered control, misdirection, timing—but now the trick was mastering him.
"And if I can't?" he asked.
Silence. "Then you're done," Gina said. "This gig is the only reason you're not already gone."
"They just don't appreciate the art" Losing the stage meant losing the only place he still knew who he was.
He stared at the Joker. The painted smile looked less like fun now and more like a challenge.
"Fine," Marco said. "Where?"
Gina exhaled. "I'll text the address. Eight sharp. Don't make me regret this."
"Gina baby, you should know Marco doesn't disappoint."
The line went dead.
Marco sat frozen, the Joker balancing on his knee. "One moment. One trick."
[Las Vegas, Nevada, USA — 19:52 PST]
The address Gina texted wasn't "uptown." It was above uptown.
Marco stood looking at a silver wonder of a building. The Doorman eyed him up and down—sequined jacket in a garment bag, stage case in the other hand, sunglasses perched on his nose—then checked a list.
"Bellini. You're cleared." He said it flatly—not impressed, not amused. Just… confirming a delivery.
Marco forced a grin. "Magnifico Marco. The—"
"Elevator's already cleared," the doorman cut in. "Forty-ninth floor."
Cleared. Like he was a hazard.
The elevator rose too smoothly. His ears popped. His molars ached—the same dull ache from the hum, like his bones remembered a frequency they didn't want to carry.
Marco pressed two fingers to his jacket pocket.
There, flat against the lining, was the Joker card.
He'd tried throwing it away twice. It always came back. Once he'd left it on the bathroom sink; he'd blinked, and it was in his wallet behind his ID, like it belonged there. Like it had always belonged there.
The doors opened to a private hallway. A woman in a charcoal suit stood waiting, tablet in hand. Not hotel staff. Not security. Something in-between.
"Marco Bellini?" she asked.
"Magnifico Marco," he corrected automatically, like a reflex.
She didn't smile. "You'll perform in the lounge. Eight minutes. No recording devices permitted. You will not approach the guests unless spoken to. Any… anomalies outside the agreed demonstration will result in immediate removal."
Marco swallowed. "Anomalies?"
Her eyes flicked, tiny and sharp, to his stage case. "You understand."
He wanted to tell her he didn't. He wanted to tell her he was terrified, and that whatever lived inside him was not a contract negotiable.
Instead, he nodded. "Of course. Controlled taste. One minute."
The woman stepped aside. "Follow me."
The lounge was velvet and glass, dim gold light reflected in mirrored panels. A curved bar. Low music. People in expensive clothes pretending not to be bored.
And then Marco saw them.
Two women near the center—tall, luminous, identical in the way only twins could be, but styled like they were deliberately emphasizing the fact: matching hair, matching cheekbones, matching confidence. The crowd subtly orbited them like gravity.
Petrova twins.
Marco's heart froze "Was this love" he thought.
No. No way. This is a prank. Gina you liar—
Darker-haired Svetlana, those late-night tabloid antics hadn't failed him—laughed at something someone said, her drink catching the swaying in her hand. Her sister's smile was sharper, scanning across the room like an owl .
Marco's palms went damp.
He felt it again—an echo, a flicker behind his eyes: a Roman hospital room, a gymnastic runway, a cold white horizon. Other lives. Not his. But brushing against his mind like fingertips through glass.
He stared. Breathed once, this is it.
Eight minutes. Normal act. One minute of… whatever this is.
He set up at the small performance area—a low circular platform, no curtains, nowhere to hide. He hated it already.
A few guests turned their attention with the polite boredom of people who'd seen everything.
Marco began with the safest things he knew: coins, rings, a silk vanish. His hands remembered the choreography even while his brain screamed don't trigger it. He kept the patter light. He kept the smiles on-time.
He kept his eyes off the twins.
And it worked.
For six minutes, he was just Marco. A struggling magician with decent technique and a bruised ego.
Then the woman in the suit glanced at her watch.
One minute.
Marco's throat drying up, he picked up the joker from his pocket.
Okay. Fine. One trick. One taste. Controlled.
He stepped forward and held up the Joker.
"I need one volunteer," he said. His voice carried, warm, confident. Practice. Mask.
A pause.
Then, to Marco's horror and dreamlike disbelief, Svetlana Petrova lifted her hand.
The room shifted. Attention sharpened.
Svetlana rose, moving with effortless stage ownership. She climbed onto the platform like it was hers.
Up close, she was even more unreal, like her beauty was that of a goddess descended.
"Name Milady" Marco asked, because that was the script.
"Svetlana," in her american accent.
"Of course" Marco muttering.
She laughed. Not offended. Delighted.
Marco swallowed panic and lifted the Joker between them.
"This is a special card," he said. "It's… stubborn."
"Like me," Svetlana replied.
Marco's laugh came out strained. "Exactly like you."
He forced his breathing steady. He let the hum in his bones rise without letting it explode. He pictured a single change. Not multiplication. Not chaos. One clean, elegant impossible thing.
He held the Joker between his palms, hands not touching, like he was warming it.
The card trembled.
"Think of any card," Marco told Svetlana. "Any."
Svetlana's gaze stayed locked on his. "Queen of Hearts."
Basic. Classic. Safe.
Marco nodding along.
The Joker card in his hands softened—like paper turning briefly into something else.
And then it shifted.
Not into a Queen.
Into a mirror-slick surface, reflective for the smallest instant—
Marco saw an angular face in that reflection.
Silver hair. Violet eyes.
The Watcher.
His chest seized. His concentration slipped.
The card spasmed—and for half a second Marco felt the old terror: a stage collapsing, lights strobing, eight years ago swallowing him whole.
He almost lost it.
Almost.
But his hands sharper as ever..
Marco snapped the glowing card... onto the table top.
The glow died.
The hum tightened.
And when he lifted the card again, it was the Queen of Hearts.
A real one. Crisp and perfect.
A single, clean transformation.
No explosion. No doves. No rain of cards.
Just impossible, controlled magic.
The lounge inhaled as one organism.
But he felt the card is warm like skin
Svetlana's expression changed. The amusement faded into something sharper.
Interest.
Not celebrity interest. Not drunk-rich interest.
Collector interest.
She took the card delicately between two fingers and small hands.
"You didn't palm that," she said softly.
Marco's voice failed. Nothing came out. He wasn't sure he trusted himself to speak without shaking.
Svetlana was consumed by the sight before her.. "Do it again."
Marco forced a smile. "Ah—unfortunately, the universe only allows one miracle per night."
She smiled back like she liked that answer. Or like she liked the idea of pushing past it.
The twin beside her—the sharper one—finally spoke. "You will perform for us again."
Marco blinked. "Sorry?"
Svetlana tilted her head. "We have a schedule. Switzerland. A meet. After. You will come."
"That's… very far," Marco managed.
"We will arrange," the sister said, already bored with the logistics. "Private. No cameras. No audience we don't approve."
Svetlana leaned closer, her perfume was overwhelming. "Lets see what you can do when you're not afraid."
Marco felt the Joker card burning.
Oh, I'm afraid, he thought.
But out loud, he said, "Anything for art."
Svetlana grinning at him. stepped off the platform and showed a black card embossed with a bull.
After handing it to him she whispered "Be ready,". "And don't disappear."
Marco watched her join Katrina and walk away, the room parting.
The woman in the suit had returned "Acceptable performance."
"So... I'm not fired?"
"You're not dead," she corrected.
Not comforting.
As Marco packed his case with shaky hands, his phone buzzed. A text from Gina:
THEY LOVE YOU.
SWITZERLAND. BACK, BABY.
Marco stared at the sky. Relief finally setting in.
"When did it..."
Back.
A single Joker where Queen of Hearts had been.
Its smile looked wider than before.
[Las Vegas, Nevada, USA - Magnifico Marco's Hotel Room - 22:17 PST]
Marco collapsed on his hotel bed. The Petrova twins. Switzerland. Everything that had ever captured his imagination as a simp was happening. The unrecorded Rome physicist, the eight-year something, the connection, the visions seeping through his skull...? That stuff was happening too. He took out his phone. Two tabs: one was for the Petrova twins and their 3.2 million followers on social media with Switzerland tagged for next week. The other was for a flight to Rome leaving tomorrow at 11:45 AM.
"Focus, Marco," he muttered. "Opportunity of a lifetime. Beautiful women. Recognition. Fame."
The Joker card grew warm in his palm.
"Or answers," he continued, quieter now. "About what's happening to me. About why I'm turning into a walking chaos factory. About why eight years matters."
His reflection in the darkened TV screen shifted. For just a moment, silver hair replaced his balding scalp. With clinical interest, violet eyes examined Marco. He almost tumbled off the edge of the bed. Upon looking again, only his own frantic reflection was present. "Okay. Okay. That's new." He felt the sensation of an incoming panic attack in his chest. "Think. Like a magician. What's the trick here?"
The trick was always misdirection. Make the audience look where you want while the real magic happens elsewhere.
The twins were shiny. Distracting. Everything he wanted.
But Rome was where the impossible started. Where the physicist woke up after eight years. Where the energy readings spiked. Where his own nightmare began.
Marco closed his eyes and saw it again: the stage collapsing, the keynote speaker (Dr. Ikoo, he now knew) mid-presentation about quantum fields and reality fluctuations. The lights had strobed. The whole hotel had seemed to vibrate with that deep, resonant hum—
The same hum he'd felt yesterday.
"I guess it doesn't matter who I play to if I do not survive the show," Marco said to himself. His eyes opened and he moved his fingers over the screens. He would not be canceling the flight to Rome. He would not confirm the flight to Switzerland either. He typed out a message to Gina. Need time off. Family emergency. 3-4 days. Her respond was quick. ARE YOU CRAZY? THE TWINS WANT YOU. I know. But I need this. Trust me. I don't. Gina please. He spent three minutes waiting for a response. Then, she responded. Fine. Be back by Friday, or don't bother coming back at all. The twins move on fast. Marco exhaled. Thank you. Don't thank me and don't screw up.
"Rome first. Answers first. Then maybe I'll deserve the Petrovas."
The card's smile seemed almost approving.
[Tokyo, Japan - Neon's Uncle Kenji's Apartment - 15:43 JST (Next Day)]
Neon was sitting at the tiny kitchen table, surrounded by three smartphones which were positioned in a triangle.
His own one (screen broken, two years old), Hana's (smart protective case, cherry blossom sticker), and Liu Min's (newer model, Taiwanese carrier).
"So we're going to do this? " Hana asked, nervously brushing her hair.
"It's just gathering of information, " Neon explained. "We can't be the only ones, I came to this conclusion because it's too organized. Someone is definitely tracking us. "
Liu Min, wrapped in her own embrace, said, "The mirrors have been revealing to me sisters, brothers. A man in a hospital. A woman on ice. A magician with cards that can't stop multiplying. "
"Visions? " Neon asked, his voice sharp with suspicion.
"No, not visions. Reflections. It's just like like when TV channels change. Different people, different places, but all connected by the same" She didnt complete the sentence. "Frequency? Signal? "
Hana summoned a tiny ball of ice on her fingertip and admiring the sparkle, said, "I sensed the same emotions too. This morning. Not images, just feelings. Panic. Determination. Loneliness. "
Neon was silently agree with her. "If the empathic bleed is getting stronger from the resonance field, increasing strength of it will bring more crossovers between our experiences. " He pulled up to his laptop a map of the world. "Liu Min, did you spot any familiar place when you saw these reflections? "
"The hospital had Italian on the signs," Liu Min said hesitantly. "The ice place was… I don't know. Very white. Very cold."
"Antarctica, maybe?" Neon suggested. "Climate research station?"
"And the magician?" Hana asked.
"American. Vegas, I think. There were slot machines in the background of one reflection."
Neon placed virtual pins on the map: Tokyo (three), Rome (minimum one), Antarctica (one), Las Vegas (one). "That's six confirmed. The silver-haired woman said ten."
"You heard her?" Hana looked startled.
"No. I saw her. In my reflection. She was talking to someone—or something—about Protocol 10. About subjects. About a breach." Neon's analytical mind was already processing. "We're not random. We're selected. Monitored. Part of an experiment or preparation."
"For what?" Liu Min's voice was small.
Before Neon could answer, all three phones buzzed simultaneously.
Not notifications. Not calls. Just a single, sustained vibration that made the devices slowly drift toward each other across the table's surface.
"Are you doing that?" Hana asked Neon urgently.
"No. I'm not—"
The vibration intensified. The phones began to glow faintly, screens flickering with static. Through the interference, a map appeared on each screen. The same map. Showing their current location in Tokyo.
And nine other points of light scattered across the globe.
"It's showing us," Liu Min breathed. "Showing us where everyone is."
Three lights clustered in Tokyo (pulsing in sync—themselves). One in Rome. One in Antarctica. One in Las Vegas. One in Alexandria, Egypt. One in the Colombian rainforest.
And one light that flickered uncertainly, its location shifting between multiple points like it couldn't decide where it belonged.
"Ten," Neon confirmed. "Ten awakened. Ten vessels."
The map vanished. The phones stopped vibrating. Everything returned to normal.
Except now they knew they weren't alone.
And whoever was orchestrating this wanted them to know.
[Rome, Italy - Ranger Ikoo's Stolen Apartment - 16:22 CET]
Ikoo was surrounded by scavenged, illegal tech again as he sat in the darkness of the abandoned apartment he had broken into. Stolen laptops, hacked tablets, anything to access the quantum field data he was looking for. Eight years of atrophy still left his body aching, but the power he had just gained helped him overcome his unnatural stamina. He was able to access partially his research through a backup tht he had stored in the university's security system decades before.
The String Partial Divergence Theorem stared back at him from the screen. His life's work. The mathematical proof that reality was more malleable than anyone suspected. That at quantum scales, consciousness could interface directly with probability fields.
"They suppressed it because I was right," he muttered, fingers flying across the keyboard. "The resonance wave. The awakening. It's all here in the mathematics."
His phone—also stolen—buzzed with a news alert. International flight manifest hacked and leaked. Among the passenger lists: Marco Bellini, Las Vegas to Rome, arriving tomorrow morning.
Ikoo's enhanced perception had already picked up the magician's presence in the broader resonance field. Chaotic. Undisciplined. But powerful.
"You're coming to me," Ikoo said softly. "Good. I need test subjects. I need data...
For a moment, he was elsewhere:
—A gymnasium in Rome, gravity bending around a gymnast's impossible vault—
—A frozen research station, ice whispering ancient secrets—
—A library in Egypt, a woman reading languages that shouldn't be readable—
—A rooftop in Tokyo, a teenager moving objects with pure thought—
The visions faded, leaving Ikoo gasping.
"The convergence," he realized. "It's accelerating. We're being pulled together."
A reflection in his laptop screen showed silver hair and violet eyes. A woman's voice, crystal clear despite having no source:
"Subject Ikoo. Synchronization at 67%. Your role is Anchor. When the others arrive, you will understand."
Ikoo spun around. The apartment was empty.
But her presence lingered watching from any reflective surface.
"Who are you?" Ikoo demanded. "What is Protocol 10?"
"You'll learn," the voice replied, already fading. "They're coming. The magician first. Then the others. Rome is where it begins."
"Where what begins?"
"Phase Three."
[Silver Tower, New York City - 09:35 EDT]
The Watcher studied the convergence patterns on her wall of screens. Eight confirmed subjects now aware of each other. Two still latent but showing preliminary signs.
"Subject Bellini's decision is optimal," she noted. "Choosing answers over desire shows growth."
The Protocol System Voice responded: "His chaos manifestation remains unstable. 43% chance of catastrophic failure during convergence."
"Acceptable risk. His instability may prove useful when the Breach opens." She zoomed in on the Rome feed, where Ikoo worked feverishly on his equations. "Subject Ikoo is progressing faster than projections. He's already theorizing the convergence mechanism."
"Recommendation: suppress his research access?"
"Negative. His understanding strengthens the overall framework. Let him solve it. The others will need his anchor when the incursions begin."
She switched to the Tokyo cluster. Three teenagers huddled around a kitchen table, staring at the map she'd sent them.
"They're ready?" the System asked.
"They're aware. Ready comes later." The Watcher's violet eyes gleamed. "Initiate Phase Three resonance boost. Push the convergence. I want at least five subjects in Rome within seventy-two hours."
"The Breach will destabilize with that much concentrated awakened energy in one location."
"I know," She said. "That's the point."
On screen, the map showed the nine active lights drifting subtly toward the Italian peninsula. Not all at once. Not obviously. But inexorably, like gravity pulling scattered stars toward a single point.
And in the space between spaces, in the Ex Darkside where the veil wore thin, something ancient stirred with hungry patience.
The Joker was born.
The pieces were moving.
Phase Three had begun.