David — no longer just 'Mr. Roger' in Jeremiah's mind — took his time, his big hands steady around his coffee mug as the sunlight played across the wood. For a long moment, he simply watched the shifting light, listening to the muffled clatter of dishes and the rise and fall of voices from the street outside. Jeremiah waited, uncertain, feeling the hush stretch between them, each second sharpening his nerves.

At last, David spoke, his tone low and measured. "Tell me, Jeremiah. Have you ever heard of the Cult of the End?"

Jeremiah blinked, caught off guard by the question but quick to nod. "Yeah, of course. They keep a little shrine just a few blocks from here, tucked behind the old market." He glanced away, remembering. "Back at the shelter in Central, we'd send people to them sometimes. Especially after someone lost a pet and couldn't handle the grief."

A wry smile crept onto his face. "They're not some doomsayers like people pretend, if that's what you mean. They're… gentle, in their own way. Their sermons are all about the End being just the final act in the Maker's play — not a thing to fear, or fight." He hesitated, recalling candlelit vigils and the quiet poetry sung in soft voices. The memory of gentle hands closing the eyes of the unclaimed dead caught in his throat. "People say they're odd, but they do good. Hospices, funerals, soup kitchens. They help the lost, the dying, anyone who needs a little peace. They're all about letting go, closing the cycle, rest."

He glanced up at David, voice softer. "It's not my faith, but… sometimes I think there's a comfort in it I can understand."

David's eyes softened for a moment, a flicker of approval beneath the lines of fatigue. "You've got the right of it. The Cult's always lingered at the edges, never looking to hurry. Their core belief is that the Maker's timing is perfect, and to End is to make way for new beginnings." His gaze sharpened, fixing on Jeremiah. "But let me ask you this — have you ever come across an organization called Curtain Fall?"

Jeremiah frowned, searching his memory for any hint of the name. "Curtain Fall?" He shook his head. "No, I don't think so. Another cult? Or is it political?"

David's lips twitched — not quite a smile, more a shadow of something harder. "Curtain Fall's what they call themselves when they need to seem respectable. Most folks know them by another name…" He let the silence hang a moment, eyes studying Jeremiah's reaction. "The Stagnants."

The word hit Jeremiah like a splash of ice water. His hands went still around his mug, a shiver running up his spine. "The Stagnants?" The name hovered in the air, sharp and unwelcome.

David nodded, face grave. "That's right."

Jeremiah swallowed, his voice gone thin. "I always thought they were just a rumor. A boogeyman. Stories they told out on the edges — people vanishing, houses left empty, whole families gone without a trace. It never sounded real."

David's jaw tightened, all warmth gone from his features. The shop felt colder, as if the sun itself had withdrawn behind a cloud. "They're real, lad. I wish to every Maker's star that they weren't. But I've seen what they leave behind."

He set his mug down with a quiet click, the sound oddly final in the hush. His eyes met Jeremiah's, unblinking. "Officially, Curtain Fall is an offshoot of the Cult of the End. Like the main church, they worship Stagnation — or the End, as they call it — but with one key difference."

He leaned forward, voice dropping so low Jeremiah had to lean in to catch every word.

"They see any attempt to stall the End as the highest blasphemy," David continued, his words slow and heavy, each one weighed down by bitter certainty. "As a direct attack against the Maker's grand, cosmic play. That includes Reliquum, and everything left behind by the false 'gods' who built it. To them, every day our world lingers is a day stolen from the one to come. And they'll do anything to fix that."

He leaned back, the chair creaking beneath his bulk, and let his gaze drift up toward the ceiling beams. "Curtain Fall tells itself — and its followers — that the cycle's already over. That everything left is nothing but the after-echo of a dream that should have ended. A story that's gone on far longer than it should have. We're all just ghosts, clinging to a false world, kept breathing by stubborn hope and broken rules. And the longer this world struggles on, the more it festers in the cradle of the new world."

David's eyes dropped back to Jeremiah, sharp and clear in the morning sun. "With that in mind, they aren't content to wait for the Maker's timing. Curtain Fall believes it's their duty to force the End, to accelerate Stagnation, and drop the final curtain on this cosmic play. No matter the cost. All in the twisted hope that what comes next will finally begin."

Jeremiah listened, heart thudding in his chest, the lines of David's story echoing too closely the things Mero had told him about the System. His sister's creation was meant to spark new possibilities, drive growth, stave off the End through the stubborn multiplication of choices and potential. A defiant riot of change and chance, standing against the slow suffocation of everything.

But now, hearing David's voice — heavy with the certainty of old wounds and old fights — Jeremiah couldn't shake how neatly the lines fit together. The System's purpose was to fight back the End; Curtain Fall's purpose was to call it down, to strip away every defense, even if it meant burning the world to its roots.

He felt the hairs on his arms prickle, a cold weight settling in his gut. All this talk of cosmic cycles and stolen days made the shop feel suddenly small, fragile beneath the sweep of something vast and merciless. The moment stretched between them, the hum of the city outside suddenly muffled by the enormity of what was being laid bare.

Still, Jeremiah's brow furrowed as he glanced at Billy's bowl, at the golden-eyed kraken floating serenely in the morning light. "But… what does all this have to do with Billy?" he asked at last, his voice low and uncertain. "I get that this 'Curtain Fall' is dangerous, but —" He gestured helplessly. "Why would they care about a baby kraken, or me?"

David nodded as if he'd been waiting for that question, eyes somber. "To understand that, you need to see the whole of it, Jeremiah. Curtain Fall doesn't just hate Reliquum itself. To them, the true blasphemy is the false 'gods.' The ones who built Reliquum, the beings who broke the cycle and stole the future from the jaws of Stagnation. They see every echo of that defiance — every powerful being, every trace of their legacy — as a rot to be cut out."

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He paused, and Jeremiah felt the air tighten, every creak and rattle of the shop falling away as David leaned forward. "Billy isn't just any kraken, lad. He's the direct descendant of one of those beings. A Celestial Kraken. His ancestor moved whole star clusters, snatching them from the jaws of the End, hiding life from Stagnation's reach. Some say that kraken saved more worlds than any single god or titan. And that blood runs in Billy, no matter how small he looks now."

Jeremiah's gaze flicked to Billy, the little kraken's tentacles splayed in the glass, golden eyes reflecting the morning sun. Billy looked back with a curious tilt of his head.

"To Curtain Fall," David said quietly, "Billy's bloodline is the greatest abomination of all. A living reminder that the cycle can be broken, that hope can cheat the End. They'll do anything to erase it. Anything to cleanse that defiance from the world."

Jeremiah's mouth went dry. He watched Billy, saw the tiny swirl of bubbles, the playful flick of a tentacle, and felt a surge of protective fear knot inside him.

A memory flared across Jeremiah's mind — two burning stars boring into him as he drifted in a watery abyss, weightless and small. He remembered the way the pressure of that gaze made him feel both seen and judged, ancient words pressing into him.

Protect him.

That was all the being had said, but those two words had thundered through Jeremiah's soul, both a command and a plea.

Back then, he'd taken the message at face value. Billy was just a baby. Helpless and innocent. Of course he needed protecting. But with everything David had just revealed, the memory twisted in his chest, taking on a new, urgent weight. It was no longer just about caring for a fragile creature. There was something far bigger, darker, and older at play. The words circled in his mind, echoing with new force.

A sudden, booming laugh snapped Jeremiah back to the present. The sound cut through his thoughts like a bright bell, and he blinked, disoriented, turning toward David with a furrowed brow.

David's grin was broad, crinkling the weathered lines at the corners of his eyes. "Don't go spiraling on me, lad," he said, voice carrying a familiar warmth. "I know that look. You're chewing on too many questions at once. Don't worry Jeremiah. I'm not here to ask you to fight Curtain Fall. Or anyone else for that matter. I only tell you all of this so you can understand the situation, and why we do what we do."

Jeremiah's frown deepened, the memory lingering just beneath the surface. "I don't get it," he said quietly, searching David's face for answers that weren't there. "If you didn't expect me to fight Curtain Fall, then why give Billy to me at all? It feels like there's something I'm missing."

David's gaze softened, the humor in his eyes shifting to something more thoughtful. "There's more than one way to protect someone than fighting, Jeremiah. Let me ask you this — how do you think Curtain Fall manages to hunt their targets?"

Jeremiah hesitated, mouth twisting as he considered. "I… honestly don't know. I can't imagine how a group like that would even begin."

David nodded, as if he'd expected as much. "Fair enough. Most folk wouldn't. To put it simply, Curtain Fall uses what most folks call karmic magic. Every living thing, every bond or promise or memory — it leaves a mark. Existence is made up of threads, connections weaving through all of us, stretching across lifetimes." He leaned forward, hands wrapped around his mug. "Curtain Fall can read those threads. They track their prey by following those connections — like tugging a single hair in a vast tapestry."

He paused, letting the image settle. "My people, we've spent millennia studying ways to hide from that kind of magic. To varying results." He glanced down at Billy, who was busy watching dust motes spin in a sunbeam, tentacles draped lazily over the rim of his bowl. "But one method stands above the rest. We call it weaving. Instead of cutting a thread and hoping it won't be missed, we bury it — tie it into something larger, richer, more tangled than anything they can unravel. What are the chances of picking out a single thread when it's knotted among thousands?"

David's gaze settled on Jeremiah, his expression growing earnest, almost reverent. "That's where you come in, lad. I don't know how else to put this — your tapestry is one of the most tangled and complex I've ever seen." He let out a slow breath, shaking his head in faint disbelief. "I don't know what you've gotten yourself mixed up in, or what's waiting down your road, but I've never come across anything quite like it."

A ripple of unease passed through Jeremiah, and he felt the weight of that observation like a cold draft. "And you're hoping Billy can 'hide' in that… knot?" he asked, voice a mixture of awe and wary suspicion.

David's answering grin flashed, genuine and bright. "Exactly so. Now you're catching on."

Jeremiah pressed his lips together, doubt threading through his relief. "But couldn't they just follow the connections from a different direction? If what you're saying is true, wouldn't one of those links still lead right to me? And once they found me, it wouldn't take much for them to guess who Billy is."

David's laugh was quiet but steady, reassuring in its confidence. "Lad, I told you. We've been at this longer than you can imagine. As it stands, outside of this room, there are only two beings in all existence who know both who Billy truly is, and where he's been hidden. To follow such a faint and guarded thread, without us noticing, is next to impossible. If, by some miracle, Curtain Fall ever managed to stumble onto that connection, we'd see it coming long before they could make a move."

He leaned in, his voice lowering into something almost conspiratorial. A wry glint lit his eye as he winked. "Like I said, we're not looking for a hero or a shield. We're perfectly capable of defending our own. All we ask is that you watch over little Billy, give him a home, and help him become the best version of himself."

David's words hung in the air, settling like dust motes in the golden sunlight. For a moment, Jeremiah simply stared at the man across the table, the gravity of everything finally sinking in. He looked over at Billy — small, bright-eyed, the faintest shimmer of otherworldly color in his glass bowl — and felt a tremor of both dread and fierce protectiveness bloom in his chest.

Jeremiah sat with David's words tumbling through his head, the low murmur of the city just beyond the shop's windows growing distant and indistinct. He let his gaze drift to the soft curve of Billy's bowl, sunlight playing along the glass and fracturing into tiny rainbows that shimmered across the tabletop. The little kraken floated lazily, tentacles waving in the filtered light, completely unaware of the weight that now pressed down on Jeremiah's shoulders.

He thought back to the first day Billy had come into his life. There had been so many moments since then, small and mundane, yet filled with a quiet magic: the way Billy would chirr at him in the mornings, the soft tap of tentacles against the glass when he was worried, the comfort of that strange, wordless bond growing between them.

Even now, with the threat of Curtain Fall lingering like a shadow just out of sight, Jeremiah found he could not muster the fear he might have expected. There was worry, yes, an ache for the danger Billy had always carried without knowing. But underneath it all was a stubborn, deep-rooted certainty that no amount of warnings or cosmic secrets could uproot.

He remembered the cold loneliness that had dogged him before the Menagerie, the slow grief of losing his old life, the dull ache of all the people and dreams that had slipped through his fingers. Billy was more than just a pet or a responsibility. He was a promise that Jeremiah had made to himself — a promise not to let go, not to lose someone else he cared about. Not again.

With a steady breath, Jeremiah looked up, meeting David's searching eyes. There was no bravado in his nod, only the quiet, absolute resolve of someone who had already made his choice.

He nodded.

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