A Glitch in Reality - Chapter 0051

Chapter 51

There were three objects on the table, and Jack detested two of them.
He sat in the old office chair salvaged from renovations, elbows resting on his knees, fingers interlaced in front of his mouth, staring at the long table in the center of the shed as if it were the tomb of his own money. The white lamp hanging high above fell vertically across the tabletop, casting short, harsh shadows—shadows whose value fell far short of the eight hundred thousand dollars he had seen disappear. Jack mentally checked the amount for the fourth time, in the foolish hope that the number would decrease. It didn’t. During the night, eight hundred thousand dollars had left the briefcase in three separate offers, and what the system had returned lay there, exposed in the light, like evidence of a crime.

A few meters away, Kevin sat on the ground, his back against a concrete pillar, a mug lying between his legs, trying not to say anything. It was the third time in twenty minutes that he had opened his mouth, thought better of it, and closed it again. Dentes, stretched out between the two, remained in absolute silence, with the attentive air of animals that sense their owner’s sorrow but don’t know exactly where the smell of anguish is coming from.

Jack exhaled slowly, inhaling the weariness that weighed more heavily than it deserved.

He always knew the bill would come due. From the very first night—from the beauty cream, from the dagger, from every item that had fallen into his hands for mere change but was worth tens, hundreds of times more than he had paid. No luck lasts forever, and his had been lingering for far too long, on a whim that already sounded suspicious. He expected the payback, a lost roll, a mediocre item amidst so many good ones. What he didn’t expect was that the tide would turn all at once, on the worst of nights, upon the greatest tribute he had ever offered in his life.

And the very core of his anger was right there, at the left end of the table: two combat sticks.

Jack stared at them and felt that pang again behind his eyes—the physical announcement of a headache that didn’t exist in his body. Two black batons, about sixty centimeters each, with rubber grips and slightly scratched from use. He didn’t need to stand up to know everything about them: he had already seen them against the light, looked for engravings, runes, unusual weight. There was nothing. They were batons. Ordinary batons, sold for twenty dollars a pair in any sporting goods store, hanging between boxing gloves and shin guards.

Two hundred thousand dollars.

…

Yet it had all started well. That was the part that hurt the most as he reconstructed the night: it had started exactly as always. After ten o’clock he had offered the first tribute, Kevin was on the floor, Dentes was lazily circling the table, and the familiarity of the ritual brought on the usual dry mouth and racing heart. Two hundred thousand at once — more than he had ever put into a single roll. The screen took that theatrical moment he had learned to both hate and love, and when the item materialized on the tabletop, in a puff of air that stirred up the dust, Jack leaned in with the eagerness of someone opening the letter that decides his life.

And he saw two batons.

The first thought was generous — almost optimistic. “Two hundred thousand dollars doesn’t buy firewood,” he reasoned. “That must be a special baton, something hidden, a trap, a disguised artifact.” Kevin got up, crossed the shed and stood beside him, arms crossed, and the two of them contemplated the pair with the respect reserved for expensive things.

“Two hundred grand,” Kevin murmured reverently. “That thing must be able to knock down a building.”

Then Jack read the name on the screen. He read it once without understanding, then went back more slowly and, as the words sank in, felt the blood drain from his face. Beside him, Kevin was going through the same process, moving his lips. Jack saw the same journey on his friend’s face: expectation, reading, rereading and, finally, the paralysis of someone who doesn’t know whether to laugh or call an ambulance.

They were Kick-Ass’s batons. From the movie.

Not Hit-Girl’s — that would have been an insult of dubious quality, but at least they would have had blades. No: Kick-Ass’s. Two little sticks a teenager bought at an ordinary store to play vigilante and get beaten up by car thieves. The screen announced their origin in a bureaucratic, almost mocking tone, and listed their properties the same way it had listed, weeks earlier, those of a fruit capable of rewriting the human body. Properties: none. Material: aluminum and rubber. Estimated value: twenty-two dollars.

Jack didn’t scream — and, in retrospect, he gave himself that small credit: he didn’t scream, didn’t flip the table, didn’t hit anyone. He stood still, hands flat on the tabletop, staring at the batons with an intensity that should have melted them. A buzzing filled his ears, and through it, in the background, Kevin’s voice was speaking in a careful tone — of all the words, only the amount reached him: twenty-two dollars. He had handed two hundred thousand to an interdimensional system of immeasurable power, and the system, without the slightest hesitation, had given him back twenty-two dollars in sporting goods.

Not even the Dragon Radar had failed like this. That was the comparison his brain found, from the bottom of the pit, and it said everything: the radar, useless in this world, was still a marvel from another reality, a coveted relic. The compass was the same: a perfect instrument in the wrong place. There was dignity in their defeat. There was wasted greatness. And wasted greatness is still greatness.

The batons, however, were not. They were exactly what they looked like: a pair of sticks sold on any street corner for less than a meal. The system hadn’t given him a useless treasure — it had given him simply nothing, wrapped in the price of a house.

“Bro,” Kevin’s voice broke the silence. “Breathe.”

“I am breathing.”

“You look like you’re about to bite the table.”

Jack closed his eyes, counted to five, and opened them again. The batons were still there, patient and indifferent, with their modest existence as store merchandise. He understood, then, that he would carry the image of those black cylinders for the rest of his life, kept in the same drawer of memory that held his greatest humiliations.

“Fine,” he said at last, and his voice came out surprisingly steady — a small victory. “Fine. It’s statistics. One bad roll after dozens of good ones. It was overdue. That, at least, calms me down.”

“You don’t look calm.”

“I’m processing the calm.”

…

The problem with statistics is that they have no word of honor. Jack knew that. He had spent most of his adult life dealing with numbers and knew better than anyone the relentless nature of chance: a bad roll owes nothing to anyone, a coin has no memory. He knew. And even knowing it, something older than mathematics — born from the same soil as superstitions and gamblers’ promises — whispered to him that the night owed him compensation, and that the only way to collect it was to keep going.

He offered the second tribute before prudence had finished getting dressed. Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars — a little more than the first, like someone raising their voice to be taken seriously. Kevin didn’t try to stop him; he just stepped half a pace back from the table, cautious, like someone hearing a match strike near something that has already exploded.

The screen took its time. The air folded. And, in the exact circle of the lamp, a very small object appeared. Jack noticed its size first — and his stomach sank in a reflex trained by the previous disappointment. But his eyes were still processing the impact when surprise froze him.

It was a pistol. If the term even fit. It fit entirely in the palm of a hand, silver from grip to tip, with a mirror finish that threw the light back in liquid reflections. The barrel was cylindrical, thick at the base and tapering over a few centimeters to an almost delicate nozzle, like a laboratory instrument. At first glance, it looked like a hot glue gun designed by someone with money to burn. At second glance — and Jack was already there before he realized it — it was exactly what it looked like.

Because he recognized it immediately, without reading anything on the screen, in a leap of memory that came from a previous life, from some afternoon in front of some television. His mouth opened in an incredulous laugh.

Beside the weapon, the system had also materialized a base. A small silver stand, with a perfect slot for the pistol, and a cable that ended in an ordinary household plug, almost comical. Jack looked at the cable and felt something like gratitude — the first positive emotion of the night. Because one thing was certain: if that weapon required ammunition, he would have nowhere to get it. There was no store, legal or illegal, on this planet that sold what that artifact consumed. The base solved the problem before it even existed. Just dock it, plug it in, and wait, like a phone.

He turned to the notebook, because that item deserved to be recorded. The pen slid across the paper as the screen displayed the information, and Jack meticulously copied every line:

Name: Noisy Cricket
Origin: Men in Black (1997 film)

Description:
The Noisy Cricket is a tiny silver-and-black pistol that looks more like a fancy toy than a deadly weapon. Despite its diminutive size, it unleashes devastating blasts of concentrated energy, preceded by a sharp chirp just before firing — hence its name. A single blast can vaporize a target or tear it apart outright, leaving a sonic boom and a trail of visible destruction in its wake; pushed past its limits, it spreads into an even more devastating cone. Its core holds enough energy for four blasts a day, renewed with each dawn. In the Men in Black universe, it is Agent J’s sidearm; here, it is stabilized yet still volatile alien technology, ideal for “help!” moments during robberies or situations where conventional weapons fail.

Recoil:
The kick is infamous — firing the Cricket hurls the user backward with brutal force, often slamming them into walls, the floor, or any obstacle. A firm stance helps, but doesn’t eliminate the impact.

Special properties:
– Extremely compact and easy to conceal
– Blasts leave impressive craters and few traces on many targets
– The thunderous sound makes stealthy use nearly impossible

Limitations:
– Flashy, noisy weapon, with unpredictable behavior under excessive use
– The recoil can injure or destabilize the user
– Better for emergencies than for everyday use
– Very resilient targets may shrug off the worst of the blast

Chaos Gate Note:
“Small enough to fit in your pocket. Loud enough to wake the whole block. Powerful enough to remind everyone why you don’t bring a knife to a cricket fight.”

Estimated roll value: US$95,000–180,000

Jack finished his notes, took a deep breath and, for the first time that night, felt that maybe — just maybe — the game had turned back in his favor.

The warning was explicit in every word. This wasn’t a simple tool, but a pocket-sized “doomsday hammer.” Four shots a day, each capable of opening a crater, and each use flinging his own body around as if he were a second projectile. He remembered the metahumans he had faced, one by one, and imagined how many of those duels would have been settled in seconds with that weapon in his hands — and how many deaths would have resulted. The weapon didn’t accept middle ground: it didn’t knock down, didn’t warn, didn’t allow negotiation. It vaporized. Against someone like Brad, the “walking wall” from the bank, it might be the perfect solution. But used against an eighteen-year-old kid, scared and discovering his powers in an alley, it would simply be an executioner at work.

In the margin of the notebook, he wrote “Situational” and underlined it. For when a hammer is needed instead of a scalpel.

His eyes then dropped to the last line on the screen: the price. And the night dealt him a second blow.

Estimated value: US$95,000–180,000.

He read it again: no change. He had paid US$250,000. The system, by its own measure, shamelessly admitted that it had delivered an item worth less than the tribute it received. The difference — at least US$70,000, even in the most generous estimate — had evaporated somewhere between the offering and the delivery, swallowed like a hidden fee. It wasn’t a tragedy, he thought, holding the warm weapon of mass destruction in his hands. But after the batons, that discrepancy tasted like salt in an open wound. Jack kept staring at the figure, digesting the certainty that, even when he won something good, the night charged its price with interest.

“At least this one shoots,” Kevin murmured, peeking over his shoulder.

“This one fires,” Jack confirmed.
“What does it do?”
“Makes big holes.” He turned the weapon under the light, and the silver metal gleamed along the barrel.
…
At a point where a sensible man would have already stopped, Jack decided to buy the third tribute. He considered himself a calculating man: his “second life” was built on patience, caution, and the refusal to make drunken bets. But, as he set the amount aside, he recognized the impulse guiding him: exactly the logic of the gaming tables, that irrational faith that the big win was one round away — and that stopping now would mean stepping back one step short of the prize. He saw the trap in every detail, named it, and walked into it anyway: the night was already lost, and US$350,000, after so much spending, sounded like another player’s chips.

The third tribute was by far the largest of the night. And the night took the offering seriously.

The delay in the delivery had something different about it — Jack couldn’t tell whether it was in the timing or in something else — but the hairs on his arms stood up before anything else did. On the other side of the shed, Dentes raised the lid of the chest and froze, in those seconds that precede defining events.

When the air finally gave way, the object on the table seemed small, fragile and strangely ordinary. For an instant, neither of them moved.
It was a syringe.

Amber glass body, metal plunger, needle wrapped in a plastic cap. Inside, a thick, cloudy liquid, an amber heavy with red, moving lazily like honey under the light. It could have come from any clinic or ambulance in the city. And Jack, staring at that unadorned item, felt the back of his neck go cold before his memory had even finished whispering why. The memory came vivid from the very first second, evoking a rainy night, a father kneeling before his son, a key hanging on a cord. He read the name on the display almost as a formality, aware that the cold sweat already told him everything, and the confirmation ran through his body like ice water:

He copied everything. His hands obeyed on autopilot while his mind raced. He recorded it, line by line, in shaky handwriting:

🔱 ATTACK TITAN SYRINGE 🔱
╚══════════════════════════════════════════════╝
Origin: Attack on Titan (Shingeki no Kyojin)

▸ DESCRIPTION
A simple amber glass syringe, unadorned, containing a cloudy, reddish-amber liquid that seems to pulse faintly. It is the spinal fluid of a Titan Shifter, the same fluid Grisha Yeager injected into his son on a night of desperation and betrayal. No pomp, no glory — only the weight of a destiny imposed on whoever receives it. A single dose rewrites existence, permanently and cruelly. Once injected, the bond can never be undone.

▸ IMMEDIATE EFFECTS
The liquid courses through the body with a sharp pain, as if something ancient and hungry were awakening in the veins. Within minutes, the recipient feels their blood boil and their consciousness dragged to the threshold between humanity and something greater — and more voracious. From that moment on, they gain the power to transform into the Attack Titan.

▸ TRANSFORMATION
It is neither painless nor elegant. Bones snap and reshape in seconds, muscles expand grotesquely, and skin tears as the human body is consumed by the colossal form. Consciousness and will remain, allowing the user to guide the Titan with increasing precision as they grow used to the power.

▸ GRANTED ABILITIES
• Accelerated regeneration — serious wounds close in seconds. Severed limbs can grow back, though at the cost of extreme pain and great energy expenditure.
• Complete healing upon returning to human form — old scars, poisons, and severe injuries vanish or improve drastically.
• Superhuman strength and endurance in Titan form, with the ability to regenerate the colossal mass, though at an extremely high energy cost.
• Unbreakable will — supernatural stubbornness to push forward even when body and mind beg for respite.

▸ THE PRICE
The curse is relentless: from the moment of injection, the bearer’s life expectancy does not exceed thirteen years. Each transformation speeds up that internal clock, and abusing the power — especially in prolonged combat or frequent transformations — shortens the remaining time even further. Some report constant bone pain, chronic fatigue, and the sensation that their very existence is being consumed. Others simply vanish, leaving behind only a prematurely aged body. There is no cure, no negotiation. It is absolute power in exchange for a certain and inevitable end.

❖ CHAOSGATE NOTE
“This is not a gift. It is a testament. Whoever receives it carries not only the strength of a monster, but the weight of all who came before — and the certainty of a short, intense, and almost always tragic fate.”

Estimated Roll Value: US$280,000–450,000

He stopped writing at the last line and stayed there, staring at it: thirteen years. The pen, still hovering over the paper, betrayed the dampness of his hand against the notebook. His forehead, his back, everything was sweating — that cold sweat the skin produces when you stare into a precipice.

Because that was exactly what he saw. Any other buyer would read the description and see only a power with a bad clause. But Jack knew the whole story: in his past life, he had lived through every episode of that gift. He didn’t see a clause at all; he saw walls collapsing over entire cities, saw a boy who had received this power and left a trail of destruction to the very end. A large part of the misery of an entire universe fit inside that amber vial, as if suspended in time. And now that universe had cost three hundred and fifty thousand dollars — plus one night of stubbornness — to end up on the table in the shed.

The final text of the offer abandoned the salesman’s tone: “This is not a power you earn; it is a power you inherit, and it collects its bill in years of life. Whoever receives it carries the strength of a monster and the certainty of a short, intense, and almost always tragic time.”

Jack swallowed hard. The shed had sunk into absolute silence, until Kevin came closer, read the screen over his shoulder — more slowly than usual — and took half a step back when he reached the end, like someone backing away from a cliff.

“Bro,” Kevin whispered, his voice hoarse. “Is that what I think it is?”

“Yes.”

“It’s… from that cartoon you made me watch? The one with the naked giants eating people?”

“Anime. But yes.”

Kevin kept staring at the syringe. It was a look Jack had never seen on him: measuring the object and, at the same time, the distance to it. Kevin was big, with that statue-like expression everyone knew from the news. He rarely let fear show — but now there was something there, not exactly panic, but a close relative of it.

“So, bro,” Kevin broke the silence, asking the only possible question, “are you going to inject it?”

Jack didn’t answer right away. He kept staring at the amber under the cold light of the shed. In his head, the question unfolded in layers: the power was real, of that he had no doubt. With that in his blood, whatever the problem — Brad, Doug, whoever showed up — would become a minor nuisance in the face of fifteen meters of steaming muscle driven by a relentless will. And he would have chances. There would be rolls, years of rolls, and with the system’s infinite catalog, there would surely be items capable of breaking the curse, of giving back the years, of cutting the clause and leaving only the power. It was possible. It was plausible.

But plausible wasn’t guaranteed, and this time the bet wasn’t being made with money.

“I don’t know,” he said at last, honestly. He shook his head slowly. “Now? No. And it’s not just because of the price.” He pointed at the syringe. “Think about what we do: our fights are always urban. A bank, a warehouse, a narrow street, a rooftop. A fifteen-meter titan in the middle of San Diego wins the fight and brings down the whole block — with everyone inside. As absurd as this power is, I don’t see how to use it today. Not the way we fight.”

Kevin nodded slowly. Jack saw the logic solidify on his friend’s face – and along with it, a relief that Kevin tried not to show.

“But,” Jack continued, holding the syringe up to the light for the first time with a care he didn’t even reserve for loaded weapons, “it’s something to keep.”

And so he did. He threw the syringe into the darkness. It made no sound; no glass clinked against the bottom of the chest. The darkness simply received it. The lid slammed shut with a satisfied snap, and the most terrifying item Jack had ever possessed came to exist nowhere, stored in the only safe in the city that moved faster than a car.

The sticks remained. Jack picked them up from the table, one in each hand, felt their ordinary weight, the cheap rubber of the handle, and for a second measured the distance to the trash can on the other side of the shed. He didn’t throw them. Instead, he turned to the trunk – which creaked as if breathing – and let the two sticks fall into the darkness, behind the syringe.

“I hope that one day this misfortune will be useful for something,” he murmured, unable to believe his own words.

…

Later, with Kevin already tucked away and the shed reduced to the glow of the lamp on the table and the low rumble of the sleeping trunk, Jack was still sitting, holding the Noisy Cricket. He slowly turned it in his fingers, feeling its compact weight, the still-warm metal of the loading base where it had been fitted for the last hour, next to the egg that waited patiently on the makeshift shelf.

At least he was going to use that. It fit in his overcoat pocket, and he’d take it out into the street. In two days, when they needed it, there would be four final judgment shots waiting beside his ribs. It wasn’t what he’d asked for the night before, but it was real, and it would solve the growing problems in that city.

Jack silently took stock, with an honesty that only exists without an audience. Eight hundred thousand dollars for a gun worth less than it cost; a poison too beautiful to be discarded; twenty-two dollars worth of aluminum. Placed on the scales against the cream, against the fruit, against the dagger, against the suit, nothing budged. He was still absurdly ahead. And he knew that luck doesn’t hurt on average – it hurts on nights.

What that night had given him, besides a pistol and a bottled nightmare, was a warning. The system was neither employee, nor supplier, nor partner; it owed no consistency, no satisfaction. All the generosity of the first few weeks promised nothing. It was a die rolling in the dark, indifferent to what he needed or offered; whoever started treating the miracle as a salary would end up pushing tokens into a bottomless pit – just as he almost had.

He stood up, turned off the desk lamp, and put Cricket in his inside coat pocket. Two days. Let the city do its part. His, at least that one, was already done.