Chuck Cunningham stared at the wood-paneled walls and tried to figure out what the hell was going on.

  One minute he'd been walking up the stairs at home, Mom calling that dinner was ready. The next minute he was sitting at this beat-up conference table in some room that looked like it hadn't been updated since the Nixon administration. No windows. One door. And a TV in the corner showing nothing but static.

  Three other people sat around the table, looking just as confused as he felt.

  The woman across from him wore a tight bck costume with a gold belt and some kind of cat ears. She kept checking her bck gloves like she was making sure they were still there. Pretty, but she had this weird theatrical way of holding herself, like she was performing even when nobody was watching.

  Next to her sat a guy in a business suit who looked like he was about to have a heart attack. He kept tying and loosening his tie and muttering under his breath about being te for something.

  The kid at the far end couldn't have been more than ten or eleven. Curly hair, polo shirt, the kind of hopeful face that belonged in a family sitcom.

  Chuck cleared his throat. "So, uh. Anybody else have any idea how they got here?"

  The woman in bck straightened up. "Well, *darling*, I was in the middle of a perfectly executed heist when suddenly I found myself in this charming little room." She gestured around with one gloved hand. "I'm beginning to suspect this is Batman's doing."

  "Batman?" The businessman looked up from his tie. "Look, dy, I don't know what kind of game you're pying, but I've got the Henderson account presentation tomorrow morning. My wife's family probably has something to do with this."

  The kid spoke up in a small voice. "I was just watching TV with my family. We were pnning this camping trip." He looked around at all of them. "Maybe we should introduce ourselves? I'm Oliver."

  Chuck nodded. "Chuck Cunningham."

  "Catwoman," the woman said with a little purr in her voice.

  The businessman hesitated. "Darren. Darren Stephens."

  "Okay," Chuck said. "So we're Chuck, Catwoman, Darren, and Oliver. And we're all stuck in this room with no idea how we got here."

  "I was walking upstairs," Chuck continued. "Just a normal evening. Then boom—here."

  Darren ran his hands through his hair. "This has to be some kind of spell. My wife Samantha, she's always doing things with her magic, and I keep telling her no witchcraft before breakfast, but does she listen?"

  Catwoman raised an eyebrow. "Your wife is a witch?"

  "Among other things," Darren muttered.

  Oliver looked between them. "So you think magic did this?"

  "What else could it be?" Darren stood up and started pacing. "One minute I'm walking out the door to work, the next I'm in some kind of waiting room."

  Chuck studied the room again. The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead. The TV kept showing static. "What if we're dead?"

  The words came out before he could stop them.

  Oliver went pale. "Dead?"

  "Don't say that," Darren snapped. "Don't even think it. We're not dead."

  Catwoman ughed, but it sounded forced. "If we were dead, surely the accommodations would be better. Or worse. This is just... mediocre."

  Chuck walked over to the TV and tried adjusting the knobs. Nothing but white noise. "If we're not dead, then what? Kidnapped? Some kind of experiment?"

  "I don't like this," Oliver said quietly. "I want to go home."

  For a moment, the static on the TV seemed to shift into shapes—almost like faces—before dissolving back into meaningless patterns.

  "Did you see that?" Darren stopped pacing.

  Chuck squinted at the screen. "See what?"

  "The TV. It looked like it was trying to show us something."

  They all stared at the static, but it was just static.

  The door opened.

  Chuck spun around. A tall man in a red uniform walked in. The letter "D" was embzoned on his chest, and his face looked like he'd seen things that would give most people nightmares.

  "I know who you are," the stranger said, closing the door behind him. "All of you. Chuck Cunningham. Catwoman. Darren Stephens. And Oliver."

  He looked at each of them in turn.

  "My name is Boston Brand, but most people call me Deadman. And I'm here because you need answers."

  Darren turned towards him so fast, he almost lost his bance. "Wait a minute. Are you one of my wife's friends? Or some distant retive pying games? Because if Samantha put you up to this—"

  "I have nothing to do with your wife," Deadman said calmly. "I've never met her."

  Catwoman crossed her arms. "So this has nothing to do with Batman and Robin?"

  "No."

  Oliver just stared, wide-eyed and confused.

  Chuck stepped forward. "You said you know who we are. How?"

  Deadman's expression was patient, like he'd had this conversation many times before. "You're not dead. Not exactly. You're... glitched. Victims of something called the Cunningham Effect."

  Chuck blinked. "The what effect?"

  "Yes," Deadman nodded. "It's named after you. The first of many to simply vanish. No goodbye. No expnation. Just... gone."

  Chuck felt something cold settle in his stomach. "What do you mean?"

  Deadman walked over to the TV and started fiddling with the knobs. "The Cunningham Effect is a glitch in universal reality. Some people are erased from existence, repced, or simply... vaguely remembered. But you did exist. Your lives were real. You're now in a narrative limbo, a space where people like you have to make a choice."

  The static on the TV cleared, and suddenly Chuck was looking at himself walking up those familiar stairs. His st memory.

  "There you are," Deadman said. "The st moment before the glitch."

  The picture shifted to the next day. The Cunningham kitchen. Richie and Joanie eating breakfast while Mr. C read the paper and Mrs. C flipped pancakes. A normal, happy family scene.

  Chuck leaned forward. "But why aren't they talking about me?"

  "Exactly," Deadman said. "Like I said, according to them, you never existed."

  Chuck's hands clenched into fists. "So that's it—I never was? This is insane. That's my family!"

  Deadman's voice was gentle but matter-of-fact. "I know. I've seen this before. I empathize with your pain. I can't cim to know what you're feeling, but the truth is, that's why we call this the Cunningham Effect. Your case is one of the most striking we've encountered. If it's any consotion, you'll be remembered for that."

  Chuck's voice cracked. "Yeah, well, from what you're saying my family will not."

  "It's not their fault," Deadman said. "That's just how the universe works sometimes."

  He turned to Catwoman. "Now you."

  The picture changed, showing a darker-skinned Catwoman going through her paces with Batman and Robin.

  Catwoman straightened. "First of all, I like her style. But we're not even the same color! Don't Batman and Robin see that? Last time I checked, they have a tendency to foil my pns, but they're not blind."

  Darren actually chuckled. "His name is Batman, not Blindman."

  Even Deadman cracked a smile. "Yeah, that's how it works sometimes. Something in the human brain just ignores the obvious. In their minds, that's you."

  "But she's bck," Catwoman said, still staring at the screen.

  "Exactly."

  Catwoman looked puzzled. "Okay then."

  Deadman turned to Darren. "And you."

  The TV showed Samantha talking to someone she was calling Darren. The man looked nothing like the Darren sitting in the room.

  "So the same thing happened to me," Darren said quietly.

  "Yes," Deadman confirmed.

  "At least they got the color right this time."

  Darren looked at everybody sitting at the table. "Don't look at me that way. I'm not being racist, I'm just pointing out the obvious."

  Deadman looked at Oliver. "With you, it's different." The TV showed the Brady house, the family bustling around, making pns.

  "So where am I in this?" Oliver asked.

  "That's exactly it," Deadman said. "They didn't forget about you exactly, but in their minds, you're somewhere out there doing something. You're vaguely in their consciousness, just... not important at the moment."

  Oliver's face crumpled. "So I'm not completely forgotten?"

  "No," Deadman said. "But you're not really a part of their reality anymore either."

  Deadman turned off the TV and stepped back from the table. He'd seen this moment thousands of times before, the instant when the reality of their situation truly hit them. They would need time to process, to feel whatever they were going to feel. His job wasn't to rush them through it.

  Chuck was the first to break. His fists smmed down on the conference table, making everyone jump.

  "How do parents just forget their own son?" His voice cracked with rage and something deeper—a grief so profound it made Deadman's chest tighten in sympathy. "I lived in that house for years. I pyed basketball with Richie. I helped Dad fix the car. I was there for every birthday, every Christmas morning." Chuck's shoulders shook. "And they just... what? I never existed? Like I was some kind of thing the universe decided to get rid of?"

  Deadman watched Chuck pace around the small room like a caged animal. The anger was necessary—it always came first. Better to let it burn itself out than try to contain it.

  "I matter," Chuck said, his voice breaking completely now. "I mattered to them. Didn't I?"

  Catwoman had gone very still in her chair. Deadman recognized that look—the thousand-yard stare of someone whose entire identity had just been called into question. She was staring at her own hands, flexing her fingers in those bck gloves.

  "I was iconic," she said finally, her voice ft and distant. "The costume, my purr, the way I moved through Gotham. I was Catwoman." She looked up at Deadman with sad eyes. "Do you know what it's like to be repced by someone who isn't even you? It's like the universe is saying that any woman in a cat costume will do. That I was... interchangeable."

  Her theatrical facade was cracking, revealing something raw underneath. "I thought I was special. I thought I mattered to Gotham. To Batman, even if he was trying to stop me. But apparently, any Catwoman will do."

  Deadman nodded slightly. He'd learned not to interrupt during these moments. They needed to say it out loud, needed to hear their own pain echoed in the room.

  Darren had stopped fiddling with his tie and was now gripping it like a lifeline. "Was any of it real?" he asked quietly. "My job, my home, my marriage?" He looked around the room desperately. "I loved Samantha. I loved our life together, even with all the magical chaos. But if existence can just repce me with someone else and Samantha not even noticing..."

  His voice trailed off, then came back stronger, more panicked. "What if the love I felt wasn't real either? What if it was just... an actor pying a role? What if none of us were ever real people at all, just... pceholders waiting to be repced?"

  That was always the hardest question, Deadman knew. The one that cut deepest. He'd felt it himself sometimes, in the silent hours when he wondered if Boston Brand had ever truly lived or if he'd always been nothing more than a character two men invented.

  Oliver had been quiet through all of this, but now Deadman could see tears streaming down the kid's face. When he finally spoke, his voice was small and broken.

  "I just wanted to be part of something," Oliver whispered. "The Brady family seemed so perfect, so happy. When I got to be there with them, I thought... I thought maybe I could belong. Maybe I could be a part of a loving family."

  His shoulders shook with silent sobs. "But I was never really part of it, was I? I was just... there. Taking up space until this glitch thing happened. And now they don't even really miss me because I was never that important to the family."

  Deadman felt that familiar ache in his chest—the one that came from watching people discover they'd been living in a house of gss that had now shattered. He'd done this job for so long, guided so many through this same realization, but it never got easier.

  He pulled out a chair and sat down at the table with them, letting the silence stretch. Sometimes the best thing he could do was simply be present while they grieved for lives that had been real, even if the world had forgotten them.

  "You're all normal to feel this," he said finally. "Every emotion you're having is valid. The love you felt, Chuck—for your family—that was real. The pride you took in being Catwoman, that was real too. Darren, what you shared with Samantha was real. And Oliver..." He looked at the crying child. "You did belong somewhere. The fact that you're here, that you remember, proves you were real."

  He leaned forward slightly. "The universe glitched. We don't know why it changed. But that doesn't mean you don't matter. It just means the world forgot people that are precious."

  The room grew quiet. For a long moment, no one moved. Then Oliver gnced at the closed door.

  "What's next?" he whispered.

  Deadman followed his gaze. The door that had seemed ordinary now glowed faintly, like light was leaking through the cracks in its frame.

  "Beyond that door," Deadman said, "is a new existence. Not heaven. Not hell. Just... different. I don't know exactly what it is. But I can tell you this—it's better than being stuck here. But the choice is yours. None of you will be forced."

  They exchanged uneasy gnces.

  Chuck stepped forward first. His voice was still filled with anger. "If my family can't remember me, then I'll remember myself. I mattered, even if they don't know it. That's enough for me." He walked to the door. The glow brightened, spilling pale light across his face. With a deep breath, Chuck pushed it open and disappeared into it.

  Catwoman rose gracefully, as though shaking herself back into character. "If Gotham couldn't keep up with me... well, perhaps there's somepce better that can." She gave a sly smirk, flicked her hair back, and strolled through the glowing doorway with theatrical poise.

  Darren remained seated for a long time, his hand twisting his tie. Finally, he let out a weary sigh. "I loved Samantha. That was real. No matter what happened after, no one can take that from me." He stood slowly, straightened his tie, and whispered, "Goodbye." Then he stepped through the door.

  That left Oliver, small and trembling in his chair.

  He looked up at Deadman, his eyes wide. "But they still remember me... right?"

  Deadman hesitated before answering. "Vaguely. Like a shadow in a memory. But yes... it fades more every day."

  Oliver bit his lip. "I don't want to go somewhere new. I want to go back. Back to the Bradys."

  Deadman's brows furrowed. "You can't go back the way you were. That life moved on without you."

  Oliver's voice shook. "What about... what people talk about, ghosts. People see them sometimes. Shadows in graveyards, in houses. Could I be... one of those? Just near my family?"

  Deadman's tone grew grave. "That's dangerous. If you don't pass through the door, you linger. That's how ghosts are made. You might see them, maybe even brush against their lives—but they won't see you. And you'll be tethered to that house. If they leave, you may not follow."

  Oliver's chin trembled, but his resolve was clear. "I don't care. I want to be close to them. Even if they never know I'm there."

  Deadman studied the boy's face, sorrow in his eyes. Finally, he nodded. "It'll be lonely. It'll hurt. But if that's your choice, I can arrange it. And if, someday, you change your mind... I'll come for you again."

  Oliver gave the faintest smile through his tears. "Thank you. That's what I want."

  The boy began to fade, his form softening like mist as he slipped away from the room. For a heartbeat, the TV flickered on its own, showing the Brady living room, Mr. and Mrs. Brady ughing as the family gathered. In the corner of the room, so faint you could barely see, a small, blurred figure stood unseen.

  And then Oliver was gone.

  Deadman sat alone at the table. The glow from the door dimmed and went still. The TV returned to static.

  He sighed and leaned back in the chair, hands csped before him. Another case finished. Another set of dispced people moved on—or lingered.

  The silence pressed in.

  Finally, Deadman whispered to the empty room: "And soon enough... more will come."

  The static hissed. The lights buzzed.

  And Boston Brand waited.