One day, it all stopped.

Jesper, Wylan, Nina and Inej were coming back from a relatively successful heist that Kaz had sent them on. They were unconsciously doing the one thing they had been told never to do: letting their guard down due to a victory. They were only around the corner from the slat when open fire rung in the air. As soon as it started, the gunfire stopped, leaving a deceased razorgull in their wake and a badly wounded Zemini before them.

Nina was the first one to come to her senses, immediately picking up Jesper and rushing to the Slat with Wylan and Inej on her heels. They bolted past countless crows, promptly going to Kaz's room at the top of the Slat. Bursting through the door, they were faced with a gun-wielding teenager, seconds away from pulling the trigger. Once Kaz realised who they were, he put the gun down and opened his mouth to go on a melodramatic spiel about knocking. Then he saw Jesper.

After an hour of Wylan pacing trenches into the thin carpet of Kaz's room and Inej and Kaz crowding Jesper while Nina worked, Nina stood up straight and sighed in relief speaking the words they'd all been dying to hear; "He's okay, he just needs rest."

Inej and Wylan helped move Jesper into his own room, placing him on his bed to feel more comfortable, then they all went home; they individually lay staring at the ceiling and let their minds run wild with grim speculations of what could've happened. But those were just thoughts.

A week later, Kaz had noticed Jesper's change in personality.  Where he used to crack jokes,  speak consistently and ask ludicrous questions during jobs, he now stayed silent unless spoken to. While, in the beginning, he was pleased with the change, finding it easier to concentrate and plan without a boisterous voice following him around, he soon began to get annoyed. It was when they were reviewing a plan that Kaz finally snapped, no one else to witness. "Cut that out, now." "I'm not doing anything." "That's the point." 

They hadn't spoken for the rest of the evening after that, but it was only so long before the others had noticed. Wylan noticed when Jesper had stopped flirting with him and trying to draw even the tiniest blush to bloom. Nina realised when Jesper politely turned down her sixth invitation to their weekly waffle date. Inej realised when he no longer joked with her about Kaz's Ghezen-awful haircut and hadn't fidgeted once while they sat impatiently waiting for a job to arrive.

It all became clear that something strange was unusual was going on during a face-off with the head of the dimed-lions. "Well, if it isn't famous Mr Brekker and his precious Wraith."  Inej and Kaz's initial reaction was that of shock, because not only was Jesper not jumping at the opportunity to make himself heard, he wasn't reacting at all; his face stayed fierce with his hand on his revolver, ready to pull it out of the holster when the timing came. The two of them pushed it to the back of their minds with the unspoken agreement that they would talk about it when they got to the Slat later. With Kaz's leg being targeted in the attack, they forgot completely.

Six months had gone by and there was a new criminal in the barrel by the name of Ghost, plenty had been attacked by him, no one had ever seen him in action. People (including the Crows) had noticed he only attacked those who got on Kaz's bad side, yet none could explain the reasoning behind this.

Wylan was the first to click.

Ever since Jesper's accident changed him, he had been keeping tabs on everything about him. All the wounds he had gained since (0), all the times he had acted like his past self (0),  and all the people he had been sent after. After hearing about Ghost, he got Nina to read out the names of all the people who had reported supposed attacks by them. It was then he asked Nina the question. "What if Ghost is a literal ghost?" "Wylan, you know as well as I do, there's no such thing as ghosts." "Amuse me." "Well, it would make sense that no one sees him then. I guess if he really was a ghost I'd wonder why Matthias isn't here." "Matthias is with Djel, Nina, he's in a better place." They stopped talking about ghosts soon after that, but Wylan couldn't help but wonder.

Later that week, after days of contemplation and general sadness, Wylan pestered Kaz to let him into Jesper's room with the others. Jesper hadn't moved from the day Nina said he'd needed to rest. Nina hadn't fixed him. Nina thought she had. "He's okay, he just needs rest." The words rang out in the silence of each of their minds.