Me — background NPC number 37, coffee runner for the head of the most powerful shadow org on Earth: Guardian Axis. The place that funds and fixes every broken city after superhero punch-ups.
And here I am. Not a cameo. Not a hero. Not even comic relief.
Just John Rick. The guy who silently walked by the camera in Haze 1. Twelve minutes in.
Now I live in the invisible sky fortress. They call it "Argon's Nest."
Floats above 80,000 feet. Cloaked. Cold coffee. Terrible sleep pods.
Six days.
I've met the tech nerds, the enhanced agents, the grumpy ops guy with the mechanical jaw.
They all look at me like I've always been here.
But no one remembers me. Not even when I speak.
I'm like... decor.
But I remember everything.
Almost everything.
Six team-up movies. Eight solos. Three duo spin-offs.
I started sketching what I could before it fades.
(he gestures to his sketchpad – we catch glimpses: a scribbled HAZE in battle armor, notes like "Don't trust Ezra. Turns in Part V.")
There are gaps.
Names I used to know now swirl like static.
Whole plots I binged 10 times feel foggy.
Like my brain's buffering.
Still... I know what's coming.
The Betrayal in City of Cradle.
The fall of Solar Titan.
The secret child in Haze: Afterburn.
And most of all —
When the world ends... twice.
I'm three years before Haze I.
Three years to change nothing...
Or maybe everything.
But first —
I've got to survive the weekly team briefings.
And figure out why the janitor is always humming the Haze theme tune.
JOHN pauses. Looks out the window. The Earth floats below, quiet and distant.
JOHN (muttering to himself):
"You wanted excitement, John. Now you're in the director's cut."
INT. GUARDIAN AXIS – SKY CARRIER – TRAINING ROOM – DAY 7
Bright. Sterile. A large circular room filled with moving platforms, retractable barriers, and automated drones. Sleek, sci-fi tech pulses faintly. A few operatives spar, some run drills. JOHN RICK stands awkwardly in the corner in basic black training gear, beside three colleagues: LEXI (combat expert), MUNRO (stoic tech engineer), and ZEKE (rookie with attitude).
LEXI
(raising an eyebrow)
You sure you signed up for this session, Rick?
JOHN
(half-laughs)
Apparently I did… in my sleep.
Everyone chuckles lightly. A training drone hovers to life behind them, flashing red. Without warning, it fires a small stun dart toward John's back.
FWIP.
SLAP.
JOHN'S hand shoots back without looking — snatching the dart in mid-air. The room goes still.
ZEKE
Whoa… Did you see that?
MUNRO
That drone's set to level three. You'd need predictive motion tracking just to notice the shot.
JOHN turns his hand slowly, staring at the dart in disbelief. He didn't think. He just moved.
JOHN (V.O.)
That wasn't me.
That wasn't me.
LEXI
You ever train in reflex-capture? Neural sync? Anything off-market?
JOHN
(confused, carefully)
Uh… caffeine?
ZEKE steps forward, clearly excited.
ZEKE
Try it again. Run the auto-dodge sim.
[SIMULATION MODE: ACTIVE]
Lights flash. The room shifts. Walls retract and reveal turrets, swinging arms, and a moving platform beneath John's feet. He looks terrified.
JOHN (V.O.)
This is bad. I'm gonna die like an intern in a deleted scene.
The sim starts. Metal arms swing at his head. Dart guns hiss. John moves again — fluid, instinctual, not thinking. He ducks, rolls, slides beneath one arm and vaults off a moving platform, landing behind cover.
The others stare in disbelief as the system beeps: 91% efficiency.
End Simulation.
Silence.
MUNRO
Only way that happens...
is if your cerebellum's overclocked. That's not normal. That's meta.
LEXI
(quietly, serious now)
You hiding something, Rick?
John just breathes. Hard. Still stunned.
JOHN (V.O.)
This world has superpowers —
But 0.1% have them. I wasn't supposed to be one.
I was a background extra. A
pencil-pusher.
So why the hell do I move like the guy who gets his own movie poster?