"Sheriff," Ethan continued calmly, "I'm an outcast. Of course I know what a Hyde is—even if modern outcast society prefers to believe they're extinct."
Galpin's eyes stayed on the road, but his breathing had changed. Slower. Controlled.
"But they're not extinct," Ethan said. "Not here. Not now. There's a Hyde in Jericho, and it's the one doing the killings."
The silence stretched.
Galpin's jaw tightened. His hands gripped the wheel a little harder.
Ethan watched him from the corner of his eye. He could tell—Galpin wasn't hearing this for the first time. He already knew what a Hyde looked like. He had seen it with his own eyes.
He had watched his wife lose control.
Postpartum depression. Isolation. The transformation.
A Hyde didn't awaken without a catalyst.
And once awakened, it didn't choose violence—it answered it.
"You know," Ethan said quietly, "Hydes don't just appear. Someone unlocks them."
"Which means," Ethan added, "this isn't just about a monster. It's about who's controlling it."
He turned his head slightly toward the driver. "So, Sheriff… you don't happen to know a Hyde, do you?"
Galpin didn't answer. He stared straight ahead as he restarted the car, the engine rumbling back to life.
"How would I know anything about you outcasts?" the sheriff said shortly. "Your kind keeps its secrets."
Ethan watched him for a beat, then spoke again—calm, almost casual.
"Yeah," he said. "How could you know?"
A pause.
"It's not like you had a wife who was a Hyde."
The car lurched.
Galpin slammed his foot down, pulling over hard to the side of the road. He turned slowly, fury and something far more raw flashing across his face.
"Don't," he said, voice low. "You don't get to talk about her."
Ethan met his glare without flinching. "I'm just saying it was a joke," he said calmly. "There's no reason to get this angry."
"And, Sheriff," Ethan continued, "the Hyde condition is hereditary. If the mother had it, there's a possibility the child inherited it."
The words hung in the car.
Ethan already knew the truth Galpin refused to say out loud. The sheriff had seen his wife lose control—had watched her become something she didn't understand and couldn't stop.
Ever since, the thought had lingered in the back of his mind like a disease he was afraid to name.
Was it passed on?
That fear was one of the reasons he kept his distance from his son. Grief had hardened him, but suspicion had done the rest. Love mixed with dread was a volatile thing, and Galpin chose distance over certainty.
Humans were good at that—refusing to see the truth when it wore the face of someone they loved.
Even after Wednesday placed the image of the Hyde in front of him, Galpin had refused to connect it to his son. As a father, he couldn't. As a man, he wouldn't.
To him, monsters were always other people.
Never his own blood.
"If you want a ride, shut up until we reach Jericho," Sheriff Galpin said as he started the car.
"Okay," Ethan replied easily.
He leaned back against the seat, satisfied. He'd said what he wanted to say. Not to enlighten—just to provoke. To poke at the cracks Galpin worked so hard to seal shut.
The engine hummed as the car pulled back onto the road.
Ethan stared out the window, watching trees blur past, his expression unreadable.
'People never refuse the truth because it's unclear. They refuse it because it hurts.'
Ethan wondered—idly, almost amused—how the sheriff would react when denial finally failed him.
When the truth stopped being a theory and started breathing in front of him.
Like that, they reached Jericho.
The car pulled in front of the station, and Ethan stepped out without another word. Inside, his belongings were returned—clothes, phone, everything accounted for. Routine. Cold. Impersonal.
At the doorway, he paused and glanced back.
"Goodbye, Sheriff," Ethan said. "And one final thing—soon the truth about that monster will come out. And when the time comes…"
He didn't finish the sentence.
He turned and walked out, leaving the implication hanging in the air like smoke.
Outside, Ethan stretched his arms, rolling his shoulders as if shaking off an inconvenience rather than two days of confinement.
He smiled to himself.
"It's always fun," he muttered, "watching people's faces darken when you disturb the lies they're clinging to."
With that, he headed down the street—free, unbothered.
What he didn't know was that three figures were watching from a distance, half-hidden behind a row of parked cars.
Their eyes followed him with open hatred.
"Those weirdos ruined Outreach Day," one of Lucas's lackeys muttered. "They turned the Joseph Crackstone statue into that."
"Yeah," another agreed, jaw clenched. "They humiliated the whole town."
Lucas stood between them, arms crossed, his expression tight and calculating rather than loud with anger.
"Relax," he said. "We're not done yet."
Both lackeys looked at him.
"We stick to the plan," Lucas continued. "We let them think they won."
A slow, mean smile crept across his face.
"And then," he said, "we ruin their Raven."
*****
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