The Five Stages of Being John Doe

Chapter Three: Bargaining

John Doe had gone about his daily routine normally. He'd gotten up and looked around his dorm, having returned to it just a few days ago after having been readmitted to Wellston. He saw that his bags were still unpacked even after all this time. Perhaps he was still half-expecting to get expelled again?

Forget it and keep moving. Got dressed, ate something for breakfast, and off to classes he went. New John watched carefully as John meekly walked throughout the halls. Everyone looked at the real John with suspicion, fear, anger, resentment, everyone was on edge now that the King was back in town. What kind of horrors was he brewing up now?

The new guy in charge of his actions had something different than what they had in mind. At break time rather than meet Sera up on the roof again, he texted her and asked her to meet him in front of one of the classrooms. This one wasn't one they really had any use for, it was for a lower grade than theirs now; rather, its importance was that it was located just down the hall and to the right from the room where the Safe House was.

When Sera showed up, New John gulped. He'd always been uneasy being around her since she held so much sway over John, and could at any time either accelerate or ruin his plans with just a single word. That would mean that New John could prosper, or he would be cast down and replaced with an entirely new personality— one better than him, or one worse than King John. She was danger with a beautiful smile and a heart of gold, and New John wanted to make sure that he didn't let her down here.

John Doe greeted her and got down to business immediately, saying, "I want to join the Safe House today." All the Johns in the Personality Room watched on the edge of their seats as Seraphina was taken aback. There was no lead-up to all of this because the new personality had been preoccupied with getting things into some sort of order amongst all the others. How would she react further?

"Are you sure, John?" Caution, hesitation in her voice as she reached out to touch John's arm. "You don't have to do this right now, you know. We can just try this again later if you feel more up to it. If you try to force this now, everyone might just shut you down. I don't want to see that happen to you."

He shook his head a bit and grabbed her hand, holding it for only just a bit before letting it down as he reassured her with a smile. "It's something I've gotta do, Sera. I need to let everyone know that I'm not that evil guy anymore. I want to make amends, sure, but I'm going to be honest with you: I really do like the idea of the Safe House. When I was... who I was, you know I saw it like it was a threat aimed at me, but what I didn't see was that it was a step in the right direction. The Royals did me wrong, they did all of us wrong. But if they're willing to be rehabilitated like this and help everyone else out against the upper-tier people here that push people around like Zeke and Cecile do, then I wanna help them out. I don't want to be the Safe House's opponent anymore; I want to be one of its members."

In her light sky-blue eyes, he saw her consider his words with all the compassion that New John had come to expect. He hit the jackpot when she nodded in agreement, affirming without anymore hesitation that she'd be right by his side if he needed any support at all.

With that, they entered. The Safe House had maintained its numbers respectably after John had been suspended. There was obviously still going to be a Joker problem around without either Arlo or Seraphina stepping up to take charge as the other two most powerful students in the school. Without them, anyone under their or John's level trying to take charge would've been derided as ridiculous.

In attendance today was none other than the red-haired fury that was Blyke and his best friend the malleable and more cowardly orange-haired Isen, both fairly tall boys in their own right and members of the nobility for a reason. Their powers, a red beam of energy and the ability to lock onto targets from long ranges made them ideal partners, and of course they'd be the ones overseeing things here whilst Remi was out.