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Janna and the Age of Paradox ✦ |[SVTFOE S5 / AU] Episode 19 • Afterimage

AFTERIMAGE

The room is warm in the way a place can be warm without your permission. Detergent, old wood, and a ceiling fan that clicks like it's keeping score. Marco's blanket is pulled up to Janna's ribs, trying to be helpful without asking too many questions.

Janna lies there in his oversized shirt and underwear, hair a mess, her beanie abandoned somewhere on the floor like a shed skin. Her body is quiet in the shallow, deceptive way that comes after surviving something intense, as if the universe is giving her a ten-second grace period before it presses play again.

Marco is asleep beside her, face turned toward her shoulder, his hand half-curled near her wrist where it landed naturally and decided it belonged.

Janna stares at the ceiling fan.

It turns. It turns. It turns.

Every time she blinks, the light leaves a faint halo behind her eyelids, a lingering ghost of brightness that refuses to vanish on schedule. The halo clings anyway.

Her chest knocks, thunk, deep and annoyed, like her heart is tired of being an organ and would prefer to be a warning system. Janna exhales through her nose and tries to tell herself that she's fine. Fine is her job. Fine is her personality. Fine is the face she wears until it becomes skin.

But the ceiling fan clicks again and her eyes unfocus, and the warmth of Marco's room becomes sunlight that doesn't belong here.

✧ 🥀 ✧

Manila is loud. Not the Echo Creek kind of loud, where it's mostly cars and teenagers and someone's dad yelling about lawn care. Manila is alive-loud: motorbikes, vendors, and voices stacked on voices like a song that never stops. In the dream, Janna is small enough that the countertop looks like a cliff.

Her mother moves through the kitchen with jewelry that clinks softly, bangles and earrings and a necklace catching light like it's laughing at gravity. The air smells like heat and food and something sweet Janna can't name.

Her mother turns and says something in Tagalog, gentle and scolding and affectionate all at once, and Janna's little fingers reach for the sound like it's a blanket. The words don't land right; they smear, like the dream is struggling to keep the audio track synced. Janna tries to hold onto her mother's voice anyway.

Then: glass.

A sound like the world snapping a bone. The kitchen shatters. A bright crash. Silence follows. Not a peaceful silence, but a dead one, the kind that happens when a room empties itself of air. Janna tries to call out and her throat won't work.

She looks down and her hands are numb, her body frozen in that old, familiar way where you stop being a person and start being an object that can't be hurt if it doesn't move. Adults move fast in the periphery. Shapes, shadows, the world cleaning itself up. The awful part is how quickly everything tries to become normal again.

The scenery blurs into a classroom. Papers and forms. A teacher says her name wrong. A student laughs. Someone writes her last name without the ñ like it never existed, a glitch the system corrected. Janna watches herself learn to smile first. To be weird first. To make the joke first. So nobody else can.

The light flickers, and then she's standing before a bathroom mirror. Fluorescent light too harsh. Her reflection stares back, and it isn't her. Blonde hair. Glowing cheekmarks. Star's eyes in Janna's face, wide and frantic like a trapped animal.

The reflection speaks with Janna's mouth, but the voice is wrong: too bright, too desperate.

"I can fix it."

Janna's stomach drops through the floor. The mirror flickers. And suddenly the air is cold. Not cold like winter, but cold like ice; cold like being locked somewhere you can't breathe properly.

A white void. Voices echoing in it, two of them, bickering like coworkers stuck on the same shift.

One voice is flirty and sharp, laughing like she's bored of reality: "Cute. Stop."

The other is harsher, accusatory, like rules given teeth: "STOP TALKING. This timeline is WRONG."

They argue around Janna like she's furniture. Then one of them says a word that makes her ribs tighten: "Anchor."

"Wake up," the other snaps. "Wake up, wake up, wake—"

Janna's chest knocks, THUNK, and the dream shatters like glass in reverse.

✧ 🥀 ✧

She bolts upright in the dark. Breath gone. Skin crawling. The room is Marco's again, but it's wrong for a second: too real, too close, too full of air she doesn't trust.

Her hand goes to her sternum, fingers pressing over the crescent scar like she can hold her heart down by force. Her other hand attacks her cuticles, picking fast enough to hurt. Her chest knocks again, thunk, deep and irregular, like a fist on a locked door.

Marco is awake instantly. Not startled, but trained. Like his body learned this pattern the hard way.

"Hey," he says, low and steady. "I'm here."

Janna tries to answer. Only air comes out. Her eyes lock on him too hard, unblinking and scanning. Marco doesn't flinch. He shifts closer, careful, and catches her wrist gently before she tears her own skin open. Not grabbing, but redirecting. His thumb starts a slow circle over the inside of her wrist like a metronome.

"Breathe with me," he murmurs.

Janna's throat makes a sound that almost becomes a word. "...Hindi—"

Marco nods like that was a full sentence. "I know," he says softly. "I'm here."

Janna's gaze flicks to the door like she expects it to open on its own. Her jaw works once, like she's biting down on something inside her mouth. She can't explain the dream, or the ice voices, or how the mirror looked back with Star's face and promised to fix something that can't be fixed.

So she tries to do the only thing she knows how to do when her insides are screaming: she makes it smaller.

"Certified nightmare," she mutters, her voice thin but trying to be flat again.

Marco's thumb keeps circling. "Yeah," he says. "Certified."

The ceiling fan clicks. Janna blinks and the light leaves a halo behind her eyelids again, stubborn as a bruise. Still there.

✧ 🥀 ✧

Her phone buzzes a few minutes later, cruelly casual, as if the universe is tapping her shoulder. Janna snatches it up fast, like if she looks at the screen first she can choose what reality is. A group chat banner pops up:

DIAZ FAMILY COOKOUT 🥘🔥

Angie: "Tomorrow! Don't bail!"

Rafael: "I'm grilling. Bring appetite."

Mariposa: "Janna come or I will cry"

Marco: "lol"

Janna stares at it. Normal life. A trap disguised as a party. Her throat tightens anyway. Not in a crying way, but in a pressure way.

Marco's voice is soft beside her. "You don't have to go if you don't want."

Janna's mouth moves automatically. "I'm going," she says.

Marco looks at her. He doesn't argue; he just watches her face like he's reading weather patterns. Janna adds, because she hates being perceived: "I can survive a cookout," she mutters. "It's literally just meat and social anxiety."

Marco's mouth twitches. "Okay."

Janna swipes the chat away like deleting it can delete tomorrow. Her chest knocks again, thunk, and she hates that her body keeps doing that, like it's reminding her she's on a leash she can't see.

She doesn't want to sit in this room with the fan clicking and the light haloing and the dream still stuck under her skin. She wants motion. She wants ritual. She wants to burn something down that won't scream back.

Janna swings her legs out of bed, already reaching for her clothes like a life raft. Marco sits up, watching her. "Janna—"

"Help me forget, Diaz," she says, like it's a command and not a request.

Marco's expression shifts from soft concern to understanding, like he knows what she means even if he shouldn't. He doesn't push. He just nods once and starts getting dressed too.

✧ 🥀 ✧

The Subaru is warm, but the air inside it is sharp, as if the afterglow is still hanging around and refusing to clock out. Janna drives like she's escorting a VIP through enemy territory: both hands on the wheel, eyes forward, chin up like she's daring the road to try her.

Marco sits there with that stupid, soft smile he gets when he's happy. Which is illegal.

Janna can feel him looking at her. "What," she says, flat.

Marco's smile widens. "Nothing."

"Wrong. Your face is doing crimes."

Marco laughs under his breath. "I'm just thinking."

"Don't," Janna says immediately.

Marco's eyes glint. "About you?"

Janna fires him a warning look. "I'm not a topic."

"You're literally my favorite topic."

Janna's mouth twitches. She kills it. "Gross," she says. "Keep it to yourself. We're not making this emotional."

Marco's voice drops a little. "Okay. But you—"

"Diaz," Janna cuts in, "if you say the word 'cuddle' right now, I'm gonna pull over and make out with a stop sign just to reset the vibe."

Marco chokes on a laugh. "What, why?"

"Because," Janna says, "I need you to understand that I can be worse."

They hit a red light. The car stops. The silence gets loud. Janna reaches into her coat pocket and pulls out her phone like she's drawing a weapon.

Marco squints. "What are you doing?"

Janna flips the camera on him. Marco's eyes widen. "Oh my god, no."

"Yes," Janna says, utterly calm.

"Why?"

Janna tilts her head, her voice low and smug. Pure trouble. "Smile," she says. "That's for my private collection."

Marco makes a noise like his soul tripped down the stairs. "Janna—"

Janna taps the screen. Click. Marco freezes mid-expression: hair wrecked, cheeks warm, eyes soft, and that stupid little smile like he's still floating. Janna nods to herself, satisfied, and slips the phone back into her pocket like she just committed a felony and didn't care.

Marco stares at her, then shakes his head with a breathy laugh. "Yup," he says. "Still a creep."

Janna glances at him, offended and pleased at the same time. "I'm not a creep," she says flatly.

Marco's smile turns softer, and his voice drops into something fond enough to be dangerous. "...My creep."

Janna's throat tightens. She snaps back into control mode immediately. "Okay," she says briskly, starting the car like she's escaping vulnerability. "Don't ruin it. We have receipts to burn."

✧ 🥀 ✧

The mini-mall lot is empty in that late-night way that makes everything feel like a set. Janna parks crooked on purpose, as if she's asserting dominance over the concept of rules, and pops the trunk like it's a ritual rather than an action. She pulls out a dented coffee can like she's been waiting for this moment her whole life.

Marco pauses. "You just... have that?"

Janna gives him a look. "Marco. Don't ask questions that have answers."

She digs into her coat pocket and produces a crumpled wad of receipts. Grocery printouts, pharmacy stubs, random little papers that prove she existed in places. Evidence. Paper trails. A timeline the universe can use against her.

She shoves them into his hands. "Carry these," she says. "If you're going to be affectionate, be useful."

Marco looks down at the wad. "Are these... your receipts?"

"Yes."

"Why do you have so many—"

"Because I am an organized person."

Marco looks at her beanie, her outfit, her "I live out of a glovebox" energy. "...You are not an organized person," he says gently.

Janna's eyes narrow. "I am organized," she repeats. "My organization is just... feral."

Marco laughs, quiet and warm. Janna hates that it makes her chest loosen. So she pivots, hard, and walks toward the dumpsters behind the building like she's on a mission. "Ritual time," she declares.

She sets the coffee can down on the asphalt. Drops the receipts inside. Pulls out a lighter like a priest drawing a sacred blade. Marco crouches beside her, close enough to warm her shoulder, not close enough to trap her. Janna flicks the lighter once. No flame. She flicks again. Nothing. She glares at it like it personally betrayed her.

Marco's voice is amused, gentle. "Need help, my creep?"

Janna doesn't look up. "No."

She flicks it a third time. The flame catches. Janna exhales like she just won a war. "Good," she mutters. "Obey."

She leans in and touches the flame to the edge of the receipts. Paper curls, darkens, and catches. The fire starts small and polite, then eats greedily, turning her evidence into ash. Janna watches like it's hypnosis. Like if she stares hard enough, the flame will burn memory too.

"No feelings," she whispers. "Only fire."

Marco shifts closer, shoulder brushing hers. "Hey," he murmurs. "You don't have to pretend to be okay."

Janna doesn't answer. Marco swallows, his voice quieter now, careful. "I'm sorry about your mom."

The line lands like a stone dropped into deep water. No splash. Just pressure. Janna keeps staring into the coffee can. For a second, she looks like a kid again. Not little, just unarmored.

Janna's lips part like she's going to joke. Nothing comes. Then she forces something out anyway, because silence is dangerous. "...She would've hated this," Janna says quietly.

Marco's breath catches. "Yeah?"

Janna nods once, eyes still on the fire. "She would've said it's dirty. And dangerous. And that I'm wasting food."

A beat. Then, softer, like it costs her: "...But she would've looked anyway."

Marco doesn't speak. He just stays beside her like a railing. Janna tosses another receipt into the flames. Watches it curl into nothing. Her chest knocks, thunk, and she hates that her body keeps insisting on being alive.

She stands abruptly, brushing off her hands like the fire is done with her. "Okay," she says, her voice snapping back to flat. "Possums."

✧ 🥀 ✧

The drainage pipe behind the mini-mall smells like wet dirt and old fries and quiet. Janna crouches at the mouth of it and pulls out a crumpled chip bag like she's clocking in. She crushes the chips into crumbs with her fingers, the motion automatic and familiar. Control in a world that refuses to be controlled.

"Alright," she murmurs. "Attendance."

A rustle answers her before she even finishes the word. Then a tiny face appears in the darkness, eyes like black beads, nose twitching like it's sniffing for lies. Another face pops out behind it. Then another. They unfold from the shadows like they remember her. Janna's shoulders drop a fraction.

"There you are," she murmurs.

She scatters crumbs with a careful flick of her fingers. The possums skitter forward, chewing like the world is simple and needs are allowed. Marco crouches beside her without asking this time. Like he's been accepted into the weird little religion of this place.

Janna taps two fingers against her knee, counting under her breath. "Chairman Scratch," she says quietly. "Tito Trash."

Marco's mouth twitches. "HR is on time."

"Shocking," Janna mutters.

A smaller possum lingers behind the others, pretending not to care. Janna angles her chin toward it. "Madame Bagel's still mad."

Marco nods solemnly. "We respect her boundaries."

Janna huffs a laugh that barely makes it out. Her eyes stay on the pipe, on the little hands, on the crumbs disappearing like evidence. The parking lot lights hum. Somewhere far away, a car passes. Normal life doing normal life things.

Janna's gaze drifts toward the coffee can behind them: embers probably dead by now, ash cooling in the dark. Her eyes go far again. Marco doesn't interrupt. He just stays near, solid.

Janna inhales. Exhales. Then, like she's talking to the air: "...My mom would've hated this."

Marco's voice is quiet. "Yeah?"

Janna nods once. "She would've called me weird," Janna says. "She would've said—" Her throat tightens. She swallows it. "—whatever."

A beat. Then her mouth twitches, almost a smile, almost a wince. "...But she would've looked anyway," she repeats, like it's the only truth she can hold without breaking.

Marco's shoulder brushes hers. Janna doesn't move away. A possum waddles closer than usual and sniffs at her shoe like it's checking her credentials. Janna huffs a tiny laugh, breath fogging. "Yeah," she whispers. "I know. I'm a mess."

The possum takes a crumb from her fingers. Its little paws tickle her skin. Janna's expression softens for half a second, then she catches herself and slams the mask back on. She clears her throat and stands fast. "Okay. Shift's over."

✧ 🥀 ✧

Back at the Diaz house, the hallway light is too warm. Janna steps inside and blinks, and the porch lamp leaves a halo behind her eyelids again: brightness that clings too long, like the mini-mall glow followed her home. Her chest knocks, thunk, and she presses her fingers to her sternum for half a second like she's checking a lock.

Marco is right behind her, quiet. He doesn't say anything sweet. He's trying. Janna is trying too. She starts up the stairs, and her phone buzzes. She freezes on the landing.

Marco pauses behind her. "Janna...?"

Janna pulls the phone out like it's a live wire. Unknown number. Then the caller ID resolves.

DR. S. REYES

Janna stares at it like it's a spider. She lets it ring. Once. Twice. Her chest knocks, thunk, as if her body recognizes the name before her brain can decide what to do about it. She declines the call.

Immediately: VOICEMAIL (1)

Marco's voice is soft. "Do you want me to—"

"No," Janna says too fast.

She opens the voicemail anyway, because she hates not knowing what's hunting her. Reyes' voice plays, calm, warm, and controlled:

"Janna Rose. It's Dr. Reyes. I reviewed your latest telemetry. Your readings are showing malignant behavior—proliferative. We need to talk. Please call me back so we can schedule a consult."

A soft click. End of message. The words don't end. Janna stares at the screen like it's still speaking. Marco takes one step closer, careful. "What did she say?"

Janna locks the phone. Pockets it. Puts her mask back on so fast it's almost funny. "She said," Janna replies, deadpan, "that she wants to ruin my weekend."

Marco's face tightens. "Janna—"

Janna blinks. The hallway lamp clings behind her eyes for a beat too long, brightness that doesn't fade on schedule. The edges of the staircase soften. The banister looks painted. The air goes quiet in that impossible, padded way, like the world is holding its breath.

And then: she's sitting in grass. Not Echo Creek grass. Not real grass. Grass that looks like somebody colored it in carefully. Muted trees in the distance. Soft flowers scattered like confetti. The sky too clean. The whole scene wrong in the way a dream is wrong: pretty enough to be suspicious.

Star sits beside her. Close. Shoulder-to-shoulder. Leaning in like she's brave enough to be gentle. Janna's hands are on her knees, still as stones. She doesn't move because moving might break it. She can feel Star's warmth through their sleeves like a memory trying to become a person. Star tilts her head toward Janna, smiling small, as if she's trying not to spook her.

"Ya know," Star says softly, her voice careful and sincere, "I don't hate you."

Janna's throat tightens so hard it feels like it might snap. Her mouth wants to make a joke, wants to sandblast the tenderness into something survivable. Nothing comes. Star's eyes shine a little, and for once it isn't manic. It's just... sorry.

"I don't," Star repeats, as if she needs Janna to believe it before the universe deletes the line. "I'm just— I'm bad at being normal."

Janna swallows. "That tracks," she manages, flat and wrecked.

Star leans her cheek toward Janna's shoulder, hesitant, asking permission without words. Janna doesn't move, but her fingers curl slightly, betraying her.

And then the light shifts: wrong. Star's cheekmarks flicker for half a second like a screen glitching, pink to something too bright and too sharp.

A distant voice slices through the field. "Janna?"

Marco's voice. The world stutters. Star dissolves like a picture being pulled off glass. Janna is back on the stairs. The banister is wood again. The lamp is just a lamp. Her hands are still curled like they were holding someone.

Her chest knocks, thunk, deep and annoyed. Janna blinks hard and the brightness smears. "...My eyes are glitching," she mutters, because she'd rather call it tech failure than admit she just got held by a ghost. "Love that for me."

Marco looks at her like he saw something pass over her face. "What happened?" he asks quietly.

Janna uncurls her hands slowly. "...Nothing," she lies.

Marco's face tightens again, but he doesn't push. Not here. Not now. "I'm fine," Janna says immediately, as if she can outrun the truth by saying it first. "I'm multitasking."

"That's not a thing."

"It's a thing. I'm doing it right now."

She continues up the stairs like she didn't just turn to stone. Her hand finds her sternum again, quick, unconscious. thunk.

✧ 🥀 ✧

Star sits curled up in bed with her plush clutched to her chest, ring box nearby like it's radioactive. Her cheekmarks flicker faintly, just a glitch, like the light got stuck on her skin. She stares at the ring like it's both hope and a weapon.

Her voice is small, stubborn, afraid: "...I'm not losing him."

✧ 🥀 ✧

A sterile prep space. Reyes moves through it with quiet efficiency, checking monitors and files like she's reading scripture. Ari stands nearby, tense, watching the numbers like they might bite.

Reyes' voice is calm. "Malignant readings," she says, tapping the screen. "Proliferation."

Ari hesitates. "Is it... dangerous?"

Reyes smiles thinly, like danger is just a category she controls. "It's inevitable," she replies. "Unless we intervene."

✧ 🥀 ✧

Back in the Diaz house, Janna lies on her back staring at the ceiling fan again. It clicks. It turns. It leaves halos when she blinks. Marco sleeps beside her, close enough to be a tether. Janna scrolls her phone until she finds the photo she took of him, hair messy and smile soft, proof that safety exists somewhere.

She stares at it until her breathing slows. Her chest knocks, thunk, quiet and deep. The light from the fan leaves a stubborn halo behind her eyes.

Janna whispers into the dark, not praying, just stating facts like she's bracing for impact: "...Tomorrow."