4. Chapter 4
The next morning, I woke up alone in my studio apartment.
Not that alone meant much. My apartment was too small to hold another person, anyway.
Morning light slipped weakly through the crooked blinds above my window, casting pale stripes across the disaster I called home.
Clothes lay abandoned across the floor where I’d kicked them off over the week.
Empty bottles crowded the corner near the sink.
A plate from two nights ago still sat forgotten beside the stove.
I should have cleaned. I always meant to. I just never seemed to have enough left in me when I came home. My mattress sat directly on the floor beneath the window. The blankets still held traces of warmth as I pushed myself upright, rubbing sleep from my eyes.
For a few disoriented seconds panic hit. Work.
Then remembered everything from yesterday—the Warden, my new assignment, the detective. And…
The Jester.
My eyes immediately found the kitchen counter where his file waited.
The thing was thick enough to stop a knife.
I stared at it from across the room. It stared back.
My head still felt scrambled from yesterday’s debrief, and calling it a conversation felt generous.
Detective Morvain had spent hours peeling me apart with questions so precise, they felt surgical.
Questions about my childhood, friends, family, current or past relationships, fears, the way I handled conflict, whether I lied, whether I avoided confrontation, and whether I preferred silence.
At first I thought she was evaluating my work before I realized she was evaluating me.
She was strategically testing pressure points, seeing where I cracked and apparently it didn’t take much.
The moment she started asking about family, I felt my walls crumble—tiny fractures spreading through them, question by question, memory by memory until irritation became anger and anger quickly morphed into blind panic.
I had nearly walked out.
I still remembered gripping the chair so hard my hands hurt. Why does this information matter?
"The Jester is curious," Detective Morvain had explained. "He likes people and especially likes to study them and learn where they bend before he decides where to push."
The memory unsettled me all over again. I stared at the file again. Morning silence settled over the apartment. Outside, cars honked somewhere in the street below. Inside, only me, my empty bottles, my unpaid notices, and a male prisoner I had never met already taking up space in my life.
My gaze drifted back to the folder.
If I was going to walk into Blackthorne and meet the most infamous inmate in Pennsylvania…
I should probably learn who he was first.
I skimmed through 20 pages to know I was fucked, and not in a good way.
Every page seemed determined to outdo the last. The Jester targeted the mobs, civilians, law enforcement–any walking breath and way of life.
He robbed banks that belonged to the civilians or even the mobs.
He pitted civilians against each other using psychological mind games.
And the worst part was that nobody could agree why. He gave no grand manifesto, no clear demands. No political faction claimed him. He did not offer a grand speech about changing the world.
Just anarchy and destruction.
I turned another page. He interrupted mob operations, caused the downfall of criminal networks—people who hurt other people. The report called it organized theft with destabilization intent. I called it confusing.
Another page told of an altercation in South Market–two rival groups brought together for negotiations.
The Jester appeared, and three hours later the district was tearing itself apart.
Witnesses gave conflicting reports. Some said he laughed.
Others swore he barely spoke. One woman claimed The Jester sat on a fountain eating smores while the streets burned around him.
I stared at that statement for a long time.
What kind of person did that?
The file documented years of chaos. There were no breaks, no disappearances, and certainly no quiet periods—just impact after impact after impact. And somehow he had been captured twice and escaped each time.
My eyes moved lower. Containment breach. Escape confirmed.
Next page.
Second apprehension was a facility compromise. Subject escaped.
Again.
It was no wonder they brought him to Blackthorne. Ordinary prisons held prisoners. Blackthorne held problems the state didn’t know how to solve. The file shifted in my lap. My gaze drifted again to the mugshot clipped near the front.
That smile and those eyes…
I still didn’t understand why he wasn’t dead. People had been executed for less. Hopefully, they would expedite his trial. Maybe politics were involved. Maybe someone important wanted answers. Or maybe the state of Pennsylvania simply hadn’t figured out how to kill him.
The thought unsettled me more than I wanted to admit.
I looked back at the papers, at the names, the incidents, and all the lives overturned in his chaotic wake. The world would probably be better without someone like this. That should have been the end of it. Case closed.
I turned to the next page.