“Oh look he’s up!” A pale face was suddenly in his line of sight, making him yelp and swing out with his camera. The guy leaped back with inhuman speed as laughter sounded to his left. There stood a woman with ragged clothing holding on to the man next to her for support as she laughed. The man rolled his eyes before his eyes turned back to Jim, narrowed in suspicion, hand tightening on his machete. Jim’s heart stopped as he recognized the fluffy black hair and hard dark brown eyes under the muck and grime.

“What are you?” The Mark look alike growled advancing towards him. The girl sighed and grabbed his arm.

“Come on Mark,” She whined, “He seems human enough, plus his reflexes are pretty good,”

“He looks exactly like me in fancy clothes and glasses, Dodger!” Mark snapped, “That’s not normal even outside the Gulch!”

“I-I can explain…” Jim piped up, “I think I can at least…”

Mark scowled as the vampire leaned down and offered Jim a hand up. With only a brief hesitation he grabbed the offered hand.

He gripped his camera close to his chest as he stared at the angered face mirrored back at him. He had no idea if he was looking at an alternate version of his creator, or if this was another undiscovered tulpa, or even if he just dropped into a video that Mark had made in the past, let alone where he was. Perhaps honesty was the best possible choice?

“So uh…” He squeaked out wishing RJ was here to do the talking, “Have you ever heard of a tulpa?”

“Tulpa?” the woman asked, “Sounds like Mexican food.”

“That’s Chalupa, Dodger,” Mark groaned, “Can you please be serious in front of the monster,”

“Oh!” The vampire breathed, “Tulpas? That’s what you and Mark are! That makes so much sense!”

Jim nodded slowly, knowing the vampire would be able to smell if Mark wasn’t entirely human. Dodger and Mark stared at the vampire in surprise.

“What do you mean Enis?” Mark asked slowly.

“Yeah, dude, Mark’s human,” Dodger corrected the vampire, Enis. Enis cocked his head.

“No he isn’t,” Enis said, “He’s never smelled entirely human. The fact he’s a tulpa makes a lot of sense actually..”

“What the hell do you mean?” Mark asked eyes going wide, “I think I would know if I was a monster or not!”

“Your name is Mark Edward Fischbach isn’t it?”

They all snapped to look at Jim who gulped and continued on the facts of his creator’s life flowing easily from his lips, “You were born in Honolulu Hawaii, not Oahu as you hate when people say Oahu as no one actually refers to the island like that. You grew up in Ohio with your father and stepmother after your parents got divorced. You had a few close friends growing up and were really close to your brother Jason, or as he started going by when he was older Thomas. You were studying to be an engineer when your father contracted cancer and ultimately died. It wasn’t until you contracted your own medical issues, including a tumor in your gut, did you decide to give up on being an engineer. After that, you decided that if you had to live your life you were going to do what you enjoyed. Have I messed anything up yet?”

The other man gripped his stomach, where Jim knew the scar from the surgery lay, face ashy grey.

“I haven’t told anyone about any of that stuff,” he mumbled softly. Jim winced, untucking his polo shirt from his slacks to flash what he knew to be an identical scar on his abdomen.

“I know because we’re based on the same person. The info I just told you is based on our creator, Mark,” Jim said, “ Tulpas are being based on mental or psychic energy willing it into existence.”

Dodger and the vampire shared a look.

“Alright, how about you two keep your clothes on and we figure out what to do with you somewhere a little more safe from monsters,” She said, jabbing her finger in Jim’s chest before she grabbed Mark’s shirt sleeve and dragged him with her.

“Wait, we just came from that way!” the vamp called running after them.

“Shut it, Enis,” Dodger snapped, “We’re like a half an hour out from the bandit shack we stayed in last night. We can wait to figure out what to do until we get there, and Mark no longer looks like he’s going to upchuck.”

Jim frowned and jogged up towards them, hand digging into his pockets, “Eat this,” Jim said holding out a few peppermints. Mark blinked down at them in stupor.

“How did you know…” He trailed off grimacing, not looking at his double’s face. Jim shrugged softly, not willing to tell him he knew that peppermint would work because it worked on all of the Ipliers, how everyone from studio always kept peppermints on hand for when Bim worked himself up too much. Silence fell heavily over them as they crunched their way through the underbrush, Mark’s color returned as he sucked on the cool candy.

“So what’s your name?”  

Jim yelped as Enis appeared right next to him with a bright grin. It didn’t take much for Jim to smile back.

“Jim,” he answered, “Jim’s name is Jim, but his family calls him CJ.”

“Family?” Dodger asked, “You have a family?”

Jim couldn’t help the nervous chuckle that bubbled from his lips, “Sure, I mean what else would I consider Mark’s other tulpas?”

“OTHERS?!”

He had been running since the explosion had sounded from the Jim’s corner of the Studio, louder and stronger than any of the normal chaos in the Office, it shook the whole building enough to knock more than one ego off their feet. In his panic, he seemed to forget his power to teleport instead rushing as quickly as he could on foot up the four flights of stairs from his greenhouse to the studio.  

The doors were already open when Bim arrived so he didn’t slow as he flew into the main studio room only to freeze at the damage.

The whole studio was scorched beyond recognition, brightly colored flames dancing nearly cheerfully on what was left of props and filming equipment around them, most of which he couldn’t even tell what it was anymore.

Hellfire, he realized with a sicking twist to his gut as he pushed himself forward towards the charred remains of a wall that divided the Jim’s News platform from his game show’s stage.

Bim heart jumped into his throat as he saw the clusters of people in the blackened room.

Off to the side stood Wilford, the pink man covered in soot but looking no worse for wear, leaning over the prone form of AJ, WJ kneeling next to him as Doctor Iplier’s working on him. The Jims’ clothes were burned almost completely away, their forms having gone back to demonic to heal the burns that should have covered most of their bodies. Even so there bloody cuts and scratches littering their pelts from the explosion, and AJ had a nasty looking head wound knitting itself back together from Doctor Iplier’s magic touch.

His eyes were then drawn to the middle of the room in the only unscathed section of the room sat RJ, his black eyes glazed lifelessly at the demolished outer wall of the studio, over the splintered remains of trees down below. His deep green was outstretched unmoving in front of him. Dark knelt to his left, talking in deep rich otherworldly tones to the smaller imp but was gaining no response, even as his demands to know what happened grew louder. Ice rain through his veins as he realized there didn’t seem to be another person in the room.

“Hilaire! ” His cry was met with a blink and RJ turning his head towards him as his own human disguise disintegrated. At the same time AJ struggling to sit up to Doctor Iplier’s protest,  but WJ batted the Doc’s hands away with a firm shake of his head as he pulled the older demon to a sitting position. Bim waited patiently until all three of his underlings were staring at him with attentiveness most would deny the news crew of possessing before his eyes softened and he ordered quietly “Report.”

The imp seemed only able to utter a single syllable.